A Different Type of Porch
by CaptainPuckleberrySwan
Summary: Before Sookie could finish rejecting him and Bill in 4x12, Eric left Bill's mansion, offsetting the entire sequence of events that was supposed to follow. Now Russell is back, Eric is missing, and Sookie is left to deal with what's beginning to feel like more supernatural trouble than she's equipped to handle. ADToP is a rewrite of Season 5, now rated M for language.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Hey everyone and thanks for checking out my fic! So I actually came up with this idea a few months ago but only just decided to start writing it now. When I was watching the Season 4 finale this summer, I was reminded of a thought I had when I saw it the first time, which was "Why on earth did Eric stick around throughout Sookie's entire speech to Bill when he clearly thought she was choosing Bill?" So, I started thinking about what would've happened had Eric just left Bill's house while Sookie was forgiving Bill/telling him she still loves him, and this is what I came up with. Hope you all enjoy it! I'm really excited for some of the stuff I have planned for later chapters~**

**Also, I don't own anything. All the characters are property of Charlaine Harris and/or Alan Ball.**

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**EPOV**

"If being with Eric is what makes you happy, then you have my blessing."

Eric couldn't help the way his face lit up in response to Bill's words. That was it, the very thing he, or rather Sookie, needed to hear. Bill had given them his blessing – not that he'd ever really given a damn about Bill's blessing, but he knew Sookie did – and she was off the hook. Bill, the one thing that had been holding Sookie back before, was no longer an issue in his relationship with her.

"See? It's okay Sookie. Bill's fine with it," he said as he approached her and the back of his finger trailed along her jawline, a strange sensation bubbling in the pit of his stomach. A second later and he recognized that strange sensation to be pure hope and excitement – something he hadn't felt to this degree since he'd been a human. She didn't have to feel guilty about Bill anymore, and Eric could finally feel optimistic about his future with the telepathic waitress.

In that moment, he had eyes only for Sookie; everything else around them was nothing but a giant blur of color. But the same, he realized, couldn't be said for her. Something was wrong. He could sense it in the way Sookie was refusing to meet his eyes. She was still holding back. Why was she holding back? "Bill had his chance," he reminded her. "He blew it. He lied to you –"

"To protect me," she cut him off, finally looking into his eyes. "And I lied to him to protect you, and you've lied to both of us so many times, we can't count. What a mess."

Rendered speechless by Sookie's words, Eric stood, stunned, as she brushed past him and took Bill's hands in her own. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. She was going back to Bill. She was forgiving him for _everything_ he'd done to her, apologizing even (and for what? For being hurt? Give him a break…). His lifeless heart, which a moment ago had been soaring at the prospect of finally having Sookie Stackhouse, promptly plummeted. If Eric hadn't been so caught up in the scene that was unfolding before him, he would have marveled at how drastically his emotions had changed in the past five seconds.

Watching this was quickly becoming nothing short of agony. Never one for melodramatics, Eric had always scoffed at humans and their ridiculous, cliché phrases like "It felt like my heart was being ripped in two" or "It was like someone was squeezing my heart". But as much as it pained him to admit, that was exactly how this was making him feel. He supposed it must be some sort of karma for all the hearts he had literally ripped in two or squeezed in his hand over the past millennia.

As he continued to watch, it became increasingly clear to Eric that there was no need for him to still be there, gaping like an idiot at The Sookie and Bill Reunion. He hadn't survived over a thousand years by sticking around in places where his presence was not welcome or necessary. As it was, he had absolutely no interest in staying here to watch Sookie and Bill dry hump each other through the night and by the looks of things, that was exactly where this declaration of love was headed. So taking Bill's caress of Sookie's face as his cue to leave, Eric sped to his clothes, dressed and left all in the span of about two seconds.

**SPOV**

It was still strange to Sookie that Bill's hand, which was in actuality as cold as ice, could make her skin ignite the way it did whenever he made contact with it. Even after everything that had happened between them, he could still make her heart leap and that knowledge honestly scared her. Logically, she knew that she _shouldn't_ still feel this way about Bill. He had betrayed her in ways she hadn't even been able to imagine before the truth had finally come out. But for whatever reason, a part of her heart apparently still belonged to him, which just made her decision all the more difficult to carry out.

"You're the love of my life."

Did Bill realize just how much his words were killing her? Wasn't the whole point of choosing nobody to prevent anyone from getting hurt?

"I know," she said, swallowing her tears. "And that just makes this harder." Steeling her resolve, Sookie forced herself to walk away from Bill and the future she might have had with him, turning instead towards Eric. But he wasn't there.

"Eric?" Sookie called out, confused as she scanned the room for the tall blonde. "Eric!" she repeated, receiving no answer. One quick mental search and Sookie discovered that the house was empty of all minds, vampire or human, except for Bill and herself. Where the heck was he? He was standing there just a minute ago. How had she not noticed him leave?

**EPOV**

Deciding he needed a minute or two to regain his composure, Eric opted to walk the first mile or so back to Shreveport after he'd sped away from Bill's property. He couldn't stand the idea of being on that asshole's grass a second longer than was necessary.

It was a wonder to Eric how Bill Compton, a 150 year old, self-loathing vampire, had come to be such a thorn in his side. He was Eric Northman; for all intents and purposes, Bill Compton was supposed to be nothing more than an insignificant little blimp on his radar. But from the moment Compton had set foot in Area 5, Eric's life had begun to spiral down to hell at an alarming rate, and the fact that all it took to derail him was Compton and his fairy princess _really_ pissed him off.

He should have known better than to give his heart to anyone, much less a human. He had been foolish to think Sookie would ever choose him over Bill. And honestly, he couldn't even blame her for it; she had told him from the start that she was Bill's. He'd been the one stupid enough to fall in love with her anyway. Well, serves him right for acting like a love-sick teenager.

And to think he'd thought he was above all that human bullshit. Well apparently he wasn't because here he was, suffering all the same. Had he learned nothing in his thousand years? He'd allowed his emotions to dominate him and given someone else the power to hurt him, something Godric had always warned him against. _'A vampire is never at the mercy of his emotions.'_ Now he finally understood why.

For fuck's sake, he had been willing to meet the True Death just to save her, had kneeled at Bill Compton's feet as his king aimed a machine gun at his head. If that wasn't a blatant warning against the dangers of acting through your emotions, then Eric didn't know what was. And the most disturbing part? If he were being completely honest with himself, Eric knew he would do it again. He would die for her, even now. And that knowledge just pissed him off even more.

_'__Jävla idiot!_' Eric mentally cursed. He needed to get a grip. Put Sookie out of his mind (and heart) and move the fuck on. What he needed to do was take his maker's advice and regain control of his emotions instead of letting his emotions maintain control over him. Shouldn't be too hard. He'd been doing so for a thousand years anyway.

* * *

Having flown the rest of the way to Shreveport, Eric found himself back at Fangtasia a good five hours before dawn. Perfect… Walking right past Chow who was apparently on bouncer duty tonight, Eric ignored the usual lust, awe and fear-filled looks of the fangbangers who flocked to his club like moths to a flame and made straight for his office. No "enthralling the vermin" today. They could live without him one more night, and if they couldn't, then Eric had seriously underestimated how pathetic these humans could be.

Eyeing the pile of work he had been forced to neglect the past week, Eric figured that now was as good a time as any to catch up on his sheriff duties. At the very least, the paperwork would provide a much-needed distraction from the thoughts and emotions that were threatening to break through the walls he had so carefully put back up during his flight to Shreveport.

The next hour, however, was spent restlessly stalking through his office, trying and failing to concentrate on the work in front of him. No matter what he did, he couldn't get the image of Sookie pushing him aside and walking to Bill out of his mind. The memory was still too fresh for Eric to shelve away like he wanted to, and the constant reminders his treacherous brain kept shoving at him were only making him more agitated as the minutes passed by.

Extracting himself from his musings, Eric felt the telltale signs of his progeny's return through the maker-progeny bond, giving him a second's warning before she came bursting though his office door.

"Where is h- Oh thank God you're back," Pam exclaimed, a scared Ginger just visible over her shoulder. Shutting the door behind her, Pam walked to the center of the room, apparently not taking any notice of the "leave me the fuck alone" vibe Eric was currently giving off. "So I take it Sookie's fine."

Eric ignored her, refusing to so much as glance at his progeny and instead kept his eyes glued to the residency request in his hand. On any other night, he would have welcomed Pam's company; her 'I don't give a fuck' attitude would have been just what he needed to snap out of it and leave his pathetic little pity-party behind him. But not tonight. He was in no mood to deal with anybody tonight, least of all Pam who had just hours before directly disobeyed him and tried to launch a fire bomb at Sookie. He didn't want to hear her apologies and he most certainly did not want to hear her opinion on Episode 500 of the Sookie Stackhouse Saga.

So Eric sent a silent prayer to the gods that Pam would just get the hint and leave him be. But luck seemed to be in a very anti-Eric Northman mood tonight. After a tense moment in which Pam seemed to realize he wasn't going to speak, she decided to try again.

Plastering a smile on her face and planting her hands on her hips, Pam said, "Look, I've been thinking. This whole Moon Goddess mess, what d'ya say we just put it all behind us? You know, let bygones be bygones, bi-girls be bi-"

"Not in the mood, Pam," Eric abruptly cut her off, still refusing to tear his eyes away from the paper in his hand and forcing himself to read dear old Angela Connors's family record: a dead maker and a single living progeny. How fitting.

He could feel Pam studying him, noticing out of the corner of his eye as the smile slid off her face and she slowly lowered her hands to her sides.

"Eric, you're angry –" she started cautiously, taking a few tentative steps towards him before he interrupted her once again.

"I'm not angry, Pam," Eric said through gritted teeth, forcing his attention to stay focused on Ms. Connors's information. It was taking every ounce of strength he had to keep his emotions in check and not lash out at Pam.

She scoffed, getting her attitude back in full in the process. "I know you're pissed, I can fucking feel it. So why don't you just yell at me already and get it over with? I get that you're mad, I can deal. But we still have a business to run and we can't do that if you're here br-"

"PAM! Not. Now." Eric finally looked up at his progeny, the papers he'd been staring at a second ago a crumbled mess in his fist. So much for dominating his emotions.

"Goddammit, Eric! I'm sorry! Ok? I'm fucking sorry. I shouldn't have tried to blow her up, I KNOW. But what was I supposed to do? You're my maker, Eric. You're my everything. How could you even think about dying like that? Just leaving me?" she pleaded with him before changing tactics. "I was being selfish, fine, but don't try and pretend you would have done anything differently if it was Godric's life on the line."

"And what, you thought I would have thanked you for killing Sookie?" Eric couldn't stop himself from shooting back at her. Of course she would use the Godric card. Had he been in a better mood, maybe he even would have bought it. But rather than calm him down or make him see her side, her answer only sparked more anger.

"No, but at least you'd still be alive. There are billions of humans out there Eric and you have centuries ahead of you. You would have found someone else. You would have moved on, and when you did, you would have thanked me for keeping you from becoming a pile of goo over this one."

Eric stared at her for a long moment, debating whether or not he wanted to continue this conversation. No, he decided. Now was not the time. Despite his best efforts, clearly Eric couldn't trust himself to keep his anger at bay and talk about this rationally with his progeny. Taking an unnecessary breath, he reined back in his rage and flattened the crumpled paper in his hand on the desk.

"I'm not in the mood to discuss this with you, Pam," he dismissed her.

Gritting her teeth but finally seeming to get the message, Pam turned to go. He didn't miss the bloody tear she furiously swiped away from her cheek as she did, but despite the guilt Eric felt over seeing it, he was still livid at her earlier disobedience and hurt from Sookie's rejection, so he made no move to stop her from leaving his office.

The minute she closed the door behind her, Eric grabbed the chair closest to him and threw it at the wall with a growl, watching furiously as the piece of furniture splintered into a dozen scraps upon impact. What the fuck had happened to his life? Everything used to be so simple: he travelled, he hunted, he fucked, he fed and for the past century, he'd been doing all of this with Pam by his side. As Sookie had so eloquently put it, he was a happy vampire. Now, he had been living in Shreveport exclusively for half a decade, ever since vampires had "come out of the coffin" and he'd had the brilliant idea of opening Fangtasia. Thanks to the Great Revelation, he couldn't hunt for food anymore either. He had to limit himself to the pitiful selection of Louisiana fangbangers, and if he were being honest, feeding just wasn't nearly as fun as it used to be when the humans he fed from were fearing for their lives while he drank. Even fucking had lost its usual appeal thanks to a certain blonde fairy named Sookie Stackhouse – at least when it came to fucking someone _other_ than said fairy. And worst of all, he couldn't even trust his progeny anymore.

Walking to his desk, Eric slumped into the seat behind it. Running his fingers through his hair, he tried to collect himself again before he lost it completely. This wasn't like him. He usually had total control over everything around him: his emotions, his impulses, his world. What he needed was to get that back.

Losing himself in his thoughts for what felt like the billionth time tonight, Eric sat completely still, his eyes unfocused and his hand still entwined in his gel-less hair. To his relief, as he sat there, he felt his anger begin to slowly creep back onto the shelf where it belonged. Alright, control over his emotions, check. One down, two more to go.

However, Eric was suddenly jolted from his waking-dead state by a steady knock at the door. Annoyed, Eric straightened in his chair as he barked, "Jesus Christ, Pam! What part of 'Not now' is so difficult for you to understand?"

Of course the door opened anyway, but to his surprise it wasn't Pam standing on the other side. It was Sookie.

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**A/N: So... what'd you think? :D Now I have a question for you guys. I'm currently debating whether or not I should write the rest of the story purely from Sookie's POV or if I should continue to switch between Eric's and Sookie's with a few special POVs scattered here and there as well. Right now, I think I'm leaning towards the first option, but I'm still not sure. So if you all could let me know what you'd rather read, I'd really appreciate your input. **

**Also just a heads up, updates may be on the slow side especially while I'm in school. I have no intention of abandoning this story however, so please don't give up on me if I take a while between updates! Of course, reviews do wonders for inspiring me to write faster... ;D Thanks everyone for the support!**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Thank you so much to everyone who followed, favorited, reviewed or even just read my story. It means so much to me to see that people are interested :) As you will see, I've decided to continue switching POVs, though I will probably be using Sookie's most often in later chapters. I really appreciated the feedback you all gave me there. Now I hope you enjoy the next chapter!**

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**SPOV**

Sookie stood, frozen in Eric's doorway as she waited for him to react. She wasn't sure what she expected him to do, heck she wasn't even sure what she _wanted_ him to do, but waiting here like this, her body tense with anticipation and her lungs apparently unable to work properly, felt worse than any of the scenarios she'd imagined on her drive over.

When Sookie had realized Eric had left while she'd been talking to Bill, she didn't know what to think. Why had he left so abruptly? How had she not even realized he'd gone? Where had he gone to? Did he leave because of her or did he have some sort of top-secret vampire business he needed to attend to? Regardless, upon realizing he'd gone, Sookie had resolved to find him and tell him what she'd meant to say at Bill's, no matter how hard doing so might be for her. He needed to hear her out and she needed to do this right. She couldn't just leave things the way they were now.

She hadn't known for sure that Eric would even be here; really, it had just been a lucky guess on her part. But after checking her own home, the only other place she could think to go was Fangtasia. Of course if he wasn't at his bar, Sookie had no idea where she would turn to next. She had no doubt Eric owned multiple estates sprinkled all over the globe, none of whose locations she knew or could get to even if she did.

But luck had been on her side tonight, for Eric was indeed here in his office, currently staring at her with an impassive look on his face. His eyes however were a whole other story. While every other part of his body betrayed no emotion whatsoever, his eyes were a sea of dozens, some of which Sookie could identify and others she could not. Among them she saw surprise in the way his eyes widened as well as annoyance in the slight furrow of his eyebrows; there was a flash of what looked to be pain in the darker specks of blue and, for a moment, she spotted something else – a strange intensity in the way his pupils dilated that made Sookie's breath hitch. But her attention was diverted from the many conflicting messages in Eric's eyes by the sound of his voice.

"What, bored with Bill already?" he drawled, projecting only disinterest and a tad of hostility towards her.

Sookie sighed before stepping further into the room and closing the door behind her. This had been one of the many scenarios she'd envisioned on her trip to Shreveport and while it wasn't necessarily the worst, it certainly hadn't been one of her favorites. Well, she supposed she now had her answer to the question of why he'd left: it had been her after all. In retrospect, Sookie figured she should have been more clear about what she was getting at when she gave her rejection speech to Bill. To Eric, it probably _did_ look like she was taking Bill back, so she really couldn't blame him for leaving.

"I'm not with Bill," she stated simply, allowing Eric to digest that little tidbit of information he clearly had not been expecting. Hey, maybe if he stopped being mad at her for supposedly getting back together with Bill, he would actually listen to what she had to say.

"Oh?" he asked, his curiosity evident in the inflection of his voice and the raising of his eyebrows. Well, she had his attention now.

"Yes, and that's actually what I came to talk to you about. I would've told you this at Bill's but you left, so…" she trailed off, not missing the way Eric sat a little straighter in his chair and cursing herself for the way his eyes lit up with what she recognized to be a spark of hope. Cheese and rice, she sucked at this. As it was, the look in his eyes alone was enough to make her question, not for the first time, whether she really was making the right decision here. 'You have to do this,' she told herself, gathering up every ounce of inner strength she could find to pull through with it.

"Eric, this past week… it's been one of the best of my life," Sookie began, walking forward with deliberate steps until she was directly opposite him with only his cluttered desk standing between them. "And I wish I could say that this week, falling for you, was just a momentary thing, just a fling that I could happily lock away in a little box before continuing on with my life. I wish I could tell myself that it wasn't really you who I fell for, that it was this other Eric, _only_ that other Eric, who I grew to love, and actually believe it. That would undoubtedly make everything so much easier. But I'd be lying to myself if I did. If I'm being honest, there's a part of me that's always wanted you and the part of me that's loved you has been there for longer than I'd care to admit as well. I love you Eric, and you deserve to know that," she paused, steeling herself to finish the sentence. "But I can't be with you."

The change in Eric's face was so drastic and happened so fast, it was alarming, the effect it had on her heart rendering Sookie temporarily speechless. For an instant, she wanted nothing more than to take back her last words. Every fiber in her being was screaming at her to forget everything she'd decided at the cemetery, just take Eric's hand in hers and kiss away her final sentence. But she couldn't. She'd promised herself she would go through with this. So all she could do now was hurriedly jump into an explanation before Eric said something to test what little resolve she had left.

"Earlier today, someone asked me what I thought my Gran would tell me if she were still here, and it got me thinking. Thinking about who she was and what her life was. She got married, she had kids and eventually she had grandbabies as well; she got to sit on her porch every night and watch me and Jason grow up, and honestly I don't think any other life could have brought her the happiness she found there. But then I also realized just how badly I want to experience that happiness too. I want that porch. I want to be a mother, live a normal life and just be normal. I want to grow old watching my grandbabies grow up. And –"

"And I can't give that to you," Eric finished for her, a weary finality to his voice that made Sookie's blood suddenly feel like lead weights pushing down on her body from everywhere within.

She smiled sadly as if to say "you guessed it" because he had. For a moment, their eyes locked, Sookie's trying to give an apology and Eric's conveying a reluctant acceptance. But then Sookie was left to watch as something in his eyes shut down, blocking her from reading him entirely.

Eric lounged back into his chair, cocked an eyebrow at her and said in a clipped tone, "So let me get this straight, you came all this way just to dump me a second time? I got the message loud and clear two hours ago, Ms. Stackhouse, don't worry. But thanks for stopping by."

With that, he picked up the papers on his desk, clearly telling her to get the hell out of his office. She opened her mouth to speak and say what, she did not know. But the damage was already done. Eric had closed himself off to Sookie, and she knew there was nothing she could say or do to undo it. So shutting her mouth, Sookie walked towards the door, pausing for a second with her hand on the knob to face Eric once more.

"I'm sorry," she said softly, knowing her apology would do him no good, but figuring she owed him that much at least. Before he could react, she turned the knob and walked out of his office, forcing herself to keep it together and not break down in the middle of Eric's bar.

* * *

**BPOV**

_'__Well, that's it then,'_ Bill thought, straightening his tie as he looked himself over in the mirror. Sookie had chosen Eric, and there was nothing he could do about it. He knew that technically, he'd already agreed to give them his blessing, but as he'd stood in his living room watching Sookie run after her new beau, Bill found that saying something and doing something were two very different things. Somehow even when he'd said it, something in Bill had believed Sookie would choose him. And for one shining moment, Bill even thought she had. He saw the love she had for him in her eyes, despite what she'd learned a year ago, and he'd thought assuring her she was the love of his life would be it – the final nail in the coffin that would bring Sookie back to him for good.

He thought he knew her, knew exactly which buttons to press to get the precise response he wanted. Not in a manipulative way, per se. Merely in the way one fully understands a person they know completely. And he was good at it; learning and using those traits was a crucial part of his old job. Yet even after pulling out all the stops – returning Eric to her, saving her from the bullet wound, sacrificing himself for her at Moon Goddess – Sookie had still picked Eric. He must have missed something, messed up some minute detail somewhere. But where he had failed, Bill simply could not figure out.

Suddenly, he stiffened in the midst of pulling on his jacket as he heard footsteps approaching his home, knowing immediately who it was. The sound of their walk was unmistakable: assured, professional and with an air of impatience that indicated someone who was perpetually pissed off. Nan Flanagan and her assemblage of guards.

Well, let the games begin.

Greeting her at the door before she could so much as knock, Bill forced a smile. "Miss. Flanagan. I figured you would be dropping by."

"Yes, well you managed to stir up yet another shit storm and I was sent to clean it up. What else is new," she stated dryly, inviting herself in. "Our dear Sheriff wouldn't happen to be here, would he?" Nan inquired, turning in the middle of the foyer to face him.

At Nan's question, Bill paused for the smallest of moments as he shut the door. Forcing himself to maintain his composure and act naturally, he responded, "No, I'm afraid not."

She narrowed her eyes and Bill prayed she didn't notice anything strange about his behavior. It wasn't like he'd even done anything wrong; he would just rather not think about or discuss Eric Northman with anyone at the moment, least of all with Nan Flanagan. Luckily, she seemed to decide to drop whatever suspicions she had against him, for a second later she whipped around again and made straight for his office, calling behind her, "That's a shame. Looks like I get to take yet another hour out of my already busy schedule to stop over at his pathetic excuse for a bar and deal with his brat of a progeny after all. Yipee."

With a sigh, Bill followed Nan, closing the doors after him and walking around to stand behind his desk to face his guest. Giving her another tight smile, he tried to direct the conversation away from his only remaining Sheriff. "And is there a reason I've been graced with your company this evening? The Marnie situation has been resolved, if that's what you are here for."

Nan scoffed. "Do I look like I could give two shits about your little Harry Potter problem? No, I was supposed to come here tonight to deliver the True Death to you and Eric Northman. That was to be my last assignment."

At Nan's words, Bill immediately tensed, his mind already on the stake he had hidden in his drawer. If Nan thought she was going to just waltz right into his home and kill him, then she was sorely mistaken. She may be nearly six times his age, but if he could develop a plan that played to his strengths and her weaknesses, with a little bit of speed and a lot of luck he might be able to put an end to Nan before she put an end to him. And of course he'd be saving Eric's life in the process, a debt he would gladly hold over Eric's head for some time, however petty.

But his plotting was put to a halt by Nan's next sentence.

"Until I quit."

Bill's eyes widened ever so slightly as he was rendered momentarily speechless. "What?" he managed to sputter out, still gaping at Nan.

"You heard me. I quit the AVL," she repeated impatiently. "And the fucking Authority," she added, a definite venom in her voice.

Bill studied her for a minute, trying to piece together what this all meant. So, Nan was originally supposed to kill him, but instead was here telling him she had quit the Authority. Which begged the question: why? Why had she quit? Why was she telling him any of this? Why was she even here in the first place? Was she still going to kill him? Bill half expected she might.

"Nobody quits the Authority," he said slowly, watching her like a gazelle watches a lion, cornered by its predator, unsure if each passing second would be its last and all the while plotting its last desperate bid at freedom and safety.

"Quit, fired. Same difference," Nan spat in response.

"And they let you live? I didn't think it was the Authority's style to simply give its employees a pink slip and watch them walk away," Bill commented dubiously. He'd always been under the impression that joining the Authority was like joining the mafia: once you're in, you're in for life and if you're out, you're dead.

"That's why I'm here you moron. Once I received the order to terminate the both of you, I knew I was next. I've been alive for eight-hundred-and-sixteen years. I refuse to be retired like a fat first-wife," she barked, her face now betraying some of the hate and wounded pride she'd been trying to keep buried throughout their entire conversation.

And suddenly everything became clear to Bill.

"So your solution is to go rogue on the Authority? And you expect me to join you?" he asked incredulously. Nobody defied the Authority; even with Nan at the head of such a mutiny, it would never work. She had to be delusional to think he would actually go along with her little suicide mission, and absolutely batshit to believe Eric would so much as consider assisting her. The whole thing was mad.

"Well it's either that or the True Death. Your choice," she stated simply, not seeming to care which option he chose. But Bill knew otherwise. She wouldn't be here asking his support if it wasn't something she felt she either needed or wanted. Or both. "And we wouldn't be alone either. There are factions within the Authority who have never been on board with its current agenda."

It seemed Nan was just full of surprises tonight. Bill took a moment to consider this information before voicing his next inquiry.

"What about my progeny, Jessica? Will she be safe here? Or will the Authority target her next?"

"Hell if I know. Honestly I highly doubt the Authority could give a fuck about a two year old, even if she's _your_ two year old," Nan answered dismissively.

Now that Sookie was with Eric and his rule as King undoubtedly terminated, Jessica was the only real tie he had left here in Bon Temps. If Nan could assure Jessica's safety, Bill supposed there truly was no reason for him to stay. Of course he didn't want to leave Jessica behind without any friend or mentor to turn to, but he wouldn't be much use to her dead and he couldn't be sure she would be safe accompanying him and Nan. Which only left one more question.

"And what exactly would we be doing should I agree to join your cause?"

"Does it really matter? Look, do you want to live or not? If not, I can promise you the Authority will be knocking on your door any minute now with a wooden stake in hand, all too happy to rid themselves of you."

Bill thought over his options. It didn't really look like he had many. If Nan was telling the truth, staying here in Bon Temps would make him nothing more than a sitting duck. He could always turn Nan down and flee on his own, but that was risky and he could only hide out from the Authority for so long. Not to mention, Bill preferred to have allies, no matter how temporary those alliances might be. He'd long since learned that as long as you were always a step ahead of your partners, it was always better to have connections to turn to should things get messy than be left without. And Nan had already proven herself to be a very useful connection to have.

Leveling his gaze with Nan's, Bill resigned to make the only decision he could.

"I suppose I really don't have much of a choice then, do I?"

In answer Nan raised an eyebrow, nodding her head to the side as if to say, "No, I suppose you don't."

* * *

**EPOV**

Eric had long since abandoned all pretenses of working after Sookie's visit, resigning instead to do what he always did when his head was swimming with thoughts he needed to sort through: pacing. It gave his body something to do and provided an outlet for his pent up frustration while his mind was at work.

Somehow Sookie's visit had made him feel both better and worse simultaneously. How that could even happen was beyond him, but Sookie always did manage to do the impossible, at least where he was concerned.

Call him shallow, but the fact that Sookie had _not_ gone running back to Bill tonight definitely took some of the sting out of her rejection. Couple that with the fact that Sookie had finally admitted to loving him, _all _of him, and Eric would have been the happiest he could remember being in his undead life – if it hadn't been for the small detail that, well, her speech was a rejection.

Even her reasons for rejecting him aroused conflicting feelings. At first, it was honestly something of a relief not to hear yet another "I love you, but I love Bill more" rationale behind Sookie's "no". But much to Eric's frustration, her real explanation may have actually been worse than any Bill-related one he'd been expecting because her reasons weren't something that was ever going to change. Her reasons, when it came down to it, weren't even about him. They were about her and the lifestyle she wanted to have, the one lifestyle he couldn't give her. And there was nothing he could do about any of it.

He hated feeling helpless; in Eric's opinion, it was the most useless and crippling emotion of them all. It was an emotion he had grown accustomed to living without since he had been made, an emotion not fit for the vampires like himself who sat at the top of the food chain and should have all the power in the world. And right now, Sookie Stackhouse was making him feel helpless.

In the next second however, all thoughts of Sookie Stackhouse were completely eradicated from Eric's mind as his eyes snapped to the office door in alarm. The sound of Pam's hair-splitting scream penetrated through even the soundproofing of his office, filling the bar which, up until a moment ago, had been empty having closed an hour earlier. The warning he had been about to call to his progeny still stuck in his throat, Eric instinctively raced towards the door, prepared to face what or whoever had raided his bar and attacked his child. He knew from the heavy sounds of their footsteps that at least a dozen of them were out there, but twelve was still a manageable number.

What he hadn't accounted for, however, was the silver net that shot at him so fast, even he, a thousand year old vampire, did not have enough time to react. This wasn't just a group of random looters. These were trained professionals.

Eric fell to the ground, the silver weakening his body considerably upon impact. Through the burning of the net cutting grid-lines into his face, he managed to squint through the metal at the door directly ahead of him as it swung open. While he lay on the floor, the silver prohibiting him from tilting his head enough to see the face of whoever had just entered, Eric could only catch sight of a pair of sharp black heels marching confidently across the room. But it turned out those heels were all Eric needed to identify his attacker.

He had to resist the urge to roll his eyes upon his discovery. What a fan-fucking-tastic night this was shaping up to be.

* * *

**A/N:** **I'm sorry! I know you all wanted to see Sookie come to Fangtasia and change her mind about rejecting Eric, but I couldn't make it ****_that _****easy. Don't worry though, Sookie will come to her senses soon enough. I also apologize if this is moving a little slowly right now; I just need to set everything up for all the fun that is to come later~**

**What'd you all think of the Bill passage? I know most of you (me included tbh) are far from Bill fans, but I felt his scene was necessary for the story. Plus I had a blast writing Nan's dialogue. She's almost snarkier than Pam… I love it! And yes, Sookie has got some serious communication issues she needs to work on when it comes to making clear to both Bill and Eric just what and who she's choosing.**

**I'll try to have Chapter 3 written and posted within the next week :) Thanks as always for all of your feedback!**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Hi everyone and Happy Halloween! I hope all of your Halloween weekends are off to a great start! I have a little treat of my own to give to you guys which I hope you'll enjoy, chapter three~ (I know, it's not quite as good as a Reese's Pieces, but it's the best I can do)**

**Also, some of you may have noticed that I changed the rating from T to M. For now, I'm only doing so because of language since I'd rather be safe than sorry there. Just thought I'd let you all know why I did that.**

**As always, I want to thank everyone for reading my story and I hope you like what I'm doing. If not, I'm always open to concrit to improve :)**

****I also want to say a special thank you to ashmo2000 for reminding me that, since they are in a car full of vampires, Pam and Eric should be conversing in Old Norse, not English. I'd completely forgotten to do that originally but have since changed it. So, any dialogue in bold from here on out is going to be dialogue spoken in Norse.**

* * *

**SPOV**

It was a wonder to Sookie how she managed to make the drive from Shreveport to Bon Temps without once crashing her car, what with her watery eyes blurring her vision and her mind most definitely not on the road for most of the ride home. Jason would probably scold the life out of her for driving in such a state – not that he had a leg to stand on there – but from the second she'd left Eric's office, the only thing Sookie wanted to do was go home and curl up in bed where she would then be free to feel miserable in peace.

To put it simply, she was an emotional wreck. First, there was the situation with Bill which on its own presented a whole boatload of problems. The fact remained that she still loved him, or at the very least still felt a lingering attachment to him which she supposed made sense since to her, everything between herself and Bill had been all fine and dandy just mere days ago. Well, if you excluded Lorena. And Bill's secret file on all-things-Sookie-Stackhouse. And that disaster of a proposal. And her continuous dreams of another vampire… Ok, so maybe things weren't exactly perfect on Sookie-and-Bill Land even before the truth about Sophie-Anne ever came out. But Sookie had believed she and Bill were in it for the long haul, and up until a week or so ago, she had been ready to fight tooth and nail to keep her relationship with Bill alive. He was her first love, her first real romantic relationship. And for the longest time, she thought his was the only relationship she would ever want to have. Those types of feelings and attachments don't just go away over-night. There was no magical off-switch when it came to love. So even after experiencing the hurt and betrayal she had at the hands of Bill, she simply hadn't been given the proper time and space to get over him yet.

That's not to say that she didn't also hate him for what he did to her. She did have some self-respect. Even thinking his name brought up such intense feelings of anger and embarrassment that it made her want to punch him in the face – anger at Bill for taking advantage of her and tricking her into loving him and embarrassment with herself for actually falling for his crap. She was furious with Bill, but in all honesty, she was even more furious with herself.

She'd been naïve when it came to him, had simply ignored all the signs she should have questioned from early on. Like why on earth a vampire who had the entire world at his feet would want to return to Bon Temps, Louisiana only to live in a home that was falling apart; a home said vampire seemed to have no intentions of fixing either. Or why he would come to Merlotte's the night they'd met when he had plenty of TruBloods at his own home and hadn't made a single move to socialize with anyone at the bar aside from her. Or how coincidental it was that the one and only time he had ever been late was the night she'd been attacked by the Rattrays, and then how he'd just magically appeared right before they could deal her a fatal blow. She had willfully pushed away any suspicions she should have had about any of it.

Hell, she had even readily ignored the file Bill had kept on her, first telling herself that it was fake and then insisting that Bill must have a perfectly reasonable explanation for having it - one she had also been afraid to ask about and even more afraid to question further when he gave it to her.

The warning bells should have been going off loud and clear by that point; the problem was, she simply didn't want to hear them.

Sookie had made a fool of herself clinging to Bill the way she had, and after experiencing that level of humiliation, she had no desire to put herself in a position where she could ever feel that way again. Which is why falling in love a second time had come as such a surprise to her, especially falling in love as soon as she did. And falling in love with Eric Northman, of all people, may yet prove to be just another example of how she never learned from her mistakes.

Sookie knew first hand just how deceptive Eric could be. In truth, she didn't even know him half as well as she'd thought she'd known Bill, and she could already list a number of reasons she shouldn't trust him any more than her ex. Eric had tricked her into drinking his blood days after allowing her to walk into two traps: the first being the airport in Dallas and the second the Fellowship of the Sun headquarters. He had also admittedly lied to her when Bill was kidnapped, claiming to not recognize the branding she and Jessica had discovered on the werewolf one night only to come to her home the next and tell her otherwise. And then there was the whole Russell debacle, which honestly made her question the rationality of her feelings for Eric more than all the other reasons combined.

Sookie knew now that Eric had had no intention of actually giving her to Russell. But he had still betrayed her. And while his betrayal may have been different that Bill's, in some ways, Sookie actually wondered if Eric's betrayal had been worse. He hadn't betrayed her by planning to hand her over to a vampire monarch, no, but he had betrayed her trust in him, a trust she had been so cautious to give in the first place. Eric was a man of many secrets, and after he'd locked her in his basement – with a collar no less – it had become apparent to Sookie that while she could trust Eric to keep her safe, she could not trust him to be completely forthcoming and honest with her about his methods, treating her like an equal rather than a pawn.

If trust was one of the fundamental things a healthy relationship was based upon, then how could she have allowed herself to fall so hard for a man she was this hesitant to give hers to… _again_?

Which brought her to the other reason she had been a step away from a sobbing mess the entire ride home: her feelings for Eric. In all honesty, Sookie was a little taken aback by just how much rejecting Eric had hurt her. She thought she had prepared herself for whatever pain the break-up would bring, but in this past week alone, she had gotten closer than she'd ever imagined she could to Eric. He had shown her that she could open herself up to someone again, had proven to her that she was still capable of loving another person (or vampire) the way she'd loved Bill, something for which she would be eternally grateful. Despite every reason she'd found not to, she had fallen in love with Eric. And if she were being honest with herself, she knew that had happened before their week together had even begun. So of course she'd expected ending things with him to hurt.

But it wasn't until tonight that Sookie also realized she may have underestimated just how deep her bond with Eric ran, for nothing had prepared her for the pang she'd felt when she'd been forced to watch that connection crumble right before her eyes. She supposed that saying about not knowing what you have until it's gone was true because she hadn't understood just how important her... whatever it was she'd had with Eric was to her until he (or really she) had broken it.

And so right now, the only thing she wanted more than her own bed was an undo button. Or a mental eraser; she didn't really care which. If it could rid her of that one image, of her last memory of Eric Northman and allow her to continue on with her life without the knowledge of what she had just lost, she would welcome it with open arms.

But apparently the world – which permitted the existence of reanimated corpses, shapeshifters, telepaths and fucking fairies for crying out loud – would not let her have this one little thing. She was stuck with her memories and her tears, and she could only pray that as time passed, she would find her porch to be worth it.

Turning into the driveway of her yellow farmhouse, now dark and quiet, Sookie switched off the engine and stared up at the house, finding its presence to be oddly soothing. She had so many memories here, some bad but most good. She, Jason and Tara had grown up here under the watchful eye of her Gran, and Sookie caught herself smiling softly at the memory of an eleven-year-old Jason, wearing nothing but a pair of old jeans and a bandana wrapped around his head, forcing her to play some stupid Indian game by taking her then-new kitten, Tina, hostage and hiding out in a tree. She then remembered the first time (of very few, she might add) she'd ever been drunk at her "graduation party" with Tara and Lafayette, babbling on about nonsense and even daring Lafayette to kiss her – just for fun.

And wasn't that what she was fighting for? Those normal moments in a more normal life. The type of life she could share with her future kids and grandkids.

So why was it that for every fond "human" memory she had of this house, there was also a fond supernatural one? Like the time she and Bill babysat Arlene's kids or when Eric had been drunk on fairy blood. Sookie would always treasure the night Bill had met Gran and she would never forget the night just a few days ago when Eric had returned to her after being released from Bill, giving her one hell of a reunion to remember. And weren't those moments just as important to her as the childhood ones she'd had with her human friends and brother? Weren't they just as worthy of being fought for?

'Now is _really_ not the time to be second-guessing your decisions Sookie,' she scolded herself, simultaneously deciding that she was only feeling this way because the loss of Bill and Eric still felt so very raw. She knew what she wanted, and what she wanted was what her Gran had; she wanted normalcy and a life fit for raising kids, a life free of all things supernatural. So swiping her hand across her cheeks to brush away any evidence of tears, Sookie quickly exited the car before she could dwell on her choices any longer.

Looking back, Sookie would realize she probably shouldn't have been so hasty in getting out of her car and entering her home. She should have taken note of the unusual stillness around the house and been more cautious of what was awaiting her inside. She should have turned on the lights when she entered her kitchen and taken a look around the room before walking to the fridge for a glass of water. She should have taken the extra second to check for any signs of human – or non-human – thoughts before even stepping foot into the eerily silent house. But then again, wasn't hindsight always twenty-twenty?

* * *

**EPOV**

"Pam," Eric said quietly, trying to placate his progeny as she struggled against the silver netting draped over the both of them. After being roughly stuffed into the trunk of a black SUV parked outside Fangtasia, he and Pam had been left to lie helplessly in the cramped space as their captors drove off, much to his annoyance.

She ignored him however, continuing to kick, claw and shove at both the car door and Eric's last nerve in what he could only assume was an attempt to break through the vehicle. Unfortunately for him, Pam didn't seem to care whether her heels made contact with the metal of the car or the flesh of his leg and if he weren't a vampire, Eric was pretty sure she would have punctured a hole straight through his right shin by now.

"Pam, stop!" he ordered more forcefully.

Though her back was still turned to him, Eric knew he finally had her attention. With a scream of frustration, she directed her anger now towards him.

"What, did Sookie steal your will to live when she gave you back your memories? Why the fuck am I the only one of us trying to break out of here? I don't know about you, but I have no intention of letting these bastards kidnap us from our own fucking bar and take us to God-knows-where to do God-knows-what," she vented.

"**They're not going to be doing anything to us**," he stated in response, switching to Old Norse and ignoring the dig at Sookie.

"**Oh really?**" she responded, seamlessly following his lead and changing languages. Eric could practically see Pam's signature raised eyebrow that was undoubtedly accompanying her disbelieving tone. "**Well you might want to tell that to the burning silver in my eye because it's telling me that one place we are not headed is on an all-expense-paid trip to Paris. Do you even know who these assholes are and what the hell they want with us?**"

"**Well those 'assholes' are from the Authority. As for what they want, I have no idea, but you're just going to have to trust me when I say they are not going to hurt us,**" he explained as patiently as he could manage after the shitty night he'd been having. And it was true. He had no idea why the hell they were here or what was going to happen to them, and had he not known Nora was involved, he'd be trying to break out of the car right alongside Pam. But Eric trusted Nora and he trusted that while it didn't seem like it now, she was ultimately trying to help them. So as much as he hated sitting idly by and leaving things up to chance, he didn't want to inadvertently screw up Nora's plan either by interfering.

"**The Authority?**" Pam repeated, unable to keep the alarm out of her voice. "**What the fuck did you do this time?**"

"**Nothing,**" he said indignantly, not appreciating Pam's assumption that he'd been the one to somehow fuck up and land them here.

"**Then I'm sorry, but I fail to see how you can be so sure they're 'not going to hurt us' when we're lying, bound in silver and against our will, in the trunk of an Authority car with no clue whatsoever as to why we're even being hunted down in the first place.**"

At this, Eric paused. He knew it would come to this eventually from the moment he'd seen Nora march through Fangtasia; he could either tell Pam about her "Vampire-Aunt" now or continue keeping his sister a secret. The way things were going, Pam was probably going to find out soon enough anyway, but the question was did he want her to? Honestly, a part of him did want to admit the truth if for no other reason than because he was fucking sick of keeping Nora's existence from his own child.

But Nora had remained a secret this long for a reason. The incident at Moon Goddess had only proven to Eric that while he could always count on Pam to have his back, she had a tendency to act irrationally and was willing to risk anything to save his life, even her own. If the situation ever arose where divulging the information about his sister would save him, he knew Pam would spill it in a heartbeat, not caring about the consequences her actions would have on Nora or herself. He couldn't risk that. For either of them.

So in the end, Eric decided to be as vague as he could in explaining the situation to Pam – at least for the time being – on the off chance she might actually let him get away with it.

"**You know how I have… friends in high places?**" he began slowly, trying to gauge Pam's reaction before continuing.

"**Go on,**" she prodded.

"**Well as you know, one of those high places is the Authority. And the group that just attacked us is being led by that friend,**" he explained, carefully choosing each word.

Pam was silent for a second, Eric hoping against hope that she would just accept what he'd said and let it go. But of course Pam being Pam, she wasn't about to make it that easy on him.

"**And what makes you so sure this 'friend' of yours hasn't turned on you and that this whole kidnapping business shouldn't be taken seriously?**" she shot at him, clearly not buying his weak explanation.

"**I just know.**"

Seriously, he couldn't come up with anything better than that?

"**You just… know,**" she repeated slowly, as unimpressed as he was with his answer.

Silence fell upon them for a moment before Pam spoke again.

"**Eric, I wasn't born yesterday. Or in this century for that matter. So stop with the bullshit already and just tell me whatever it is you're keeping from me.**"

"**I'm not-**"

"**Don't fucking lie to me, Eric,**" she impatiently interrupted, not about to take any of his shit. "**I know there's something you're not telling me. If this is because of Sookie and that blasted witch, I've already apologized. What else do you want me to do?**"

"**How about you just take me at my word and believe me when I say we are going to be fine?**" he snapped back at her, having had enough of the games and, now that he thought about it, enough of tonight in general as well.

"**Well you'll have to forgive me, but your self-preservation instincts haven't exactly been up to scratch as of late. If you want to put your life on the line because you've decided that _now_ is the time to start trusting someone other than yourself, then be my guest. But I'm not stupid enough to put my life in your 'friend's' hands too just because a recently-suicidal-vampire told me to. So unless you give me something a little better than 'I just know', I am not going to simply sit here like a dumb animal in a slaughterhouse. Just tell me the fucking truth,**" she demanded.

"**I can't.**"

"**What do you mean, you can't? What is so damn special about this friend of yours that you 'just know' they're going to help get us out of the deep shit we're in?**"

Eric took a moment to consider his options. It was obvious that Pam was not going to let the subject drop, not that he could honestly blame her. But he couldn't help but wish that for once tonight, he would just catch a fucking break and something would actually go his way. Between Marnie's attempt to fry him, Sookie rejecting him… twice, Nora's surprise visit and Pam now demanding answers he wasn't yet ready to give, Eric found himself wishing for the first time in his undead life that the sun would just fucking rise already so he could move on from this god-awful night. He also wished he would stop feeling so damn sorry for himself. He wasn't used to it and now that he was becoming reacquainted with the feeling, he found he hated it even more than before.

But right now, he needed to decide what to do about Pam and Nora, and the more he looked at it, the more he realized he no longer had a choice but to tell his progeny the truth.

"**Because… because she's my sister.**"

Pam froze.

"**I'm sorry, it sounded to me like you just said you have a sister. But I know that can't be true because not once in over a century have you ever mentioned having a fucking sister,**" she finally responded, her tone deceptively sweet in the beginning, only to grow progressively fiercer and angrier to the end.

"**I couldn't tell you about her because doing so would have endangered both her life and yours,**" he said, trying to keep his explanation short in the hopes that the following conversation would follow said example.

"**I can take care of myself. You didn't have to protect me,**" she huffed.

"**Actually, I did,**" he said sharply. "**So you can either accept that and let it be or continue being pissed at me. Frankly, I don't really care which, but now is not the time for you to have one of your-**"

"**One of my what? What do you think this is even about?**" Pam cut him off, her tone dangerously low. "**I've shared my entire life with you. You know all my secrets. I trust you with _everything_, Eric. Does that mean nothing to you?**"

Pam was quiet for a minute, the atmosphere in the car suddenly becoming uncomfortably tense. Eric was about to say something himself just to break the silence when she spoke again, her voice now uncharacteristically quiet with a hint of vulnerability to it that he was not used to hearing from her. "**You could have at least told me this sister of yours existed. I didn't need to know who she was or that she was in the Authority.**"

And just like that, Eric felt like the biggest ass on the fucking planet – a planet that, mind you, was also home to Bill Compton. He wasn't the only one having a rough night tonight, or a rough couple of nights for that matter, and instead of being a halfway-decent maker and actually thinking of his progeny, he had completely ignored everything _she_ had recently endured. He hadn't even realized why learning about Nora now, of all times, was bothering Pam more than it normally would have. She wasn't just upset he hadn't shared the information with her earlier. The recent rift between them was hurting her more than she was letting on, and it wasn't until now that he could see why.

While he'd been off at Sookie's this past week, Pam had been left alone to watch powerlessly as he distanced himself from her, unsure if she would ever get her maker back while also dealing with a witch-spell of her own. Then even after his curse had been lifted, it had become clear that everything between them had changed because of the week he'd spent without his memories. Before then, the only people he would have died for – at least to her knowledge – were herself and Godric. She had grown accustomed to having him practically to herself until Sookie had entered the picture. And the other night when he'd been willing to sacrifice himself for Sookie's life, Pam had been forced to come to terms with the fact that she was going to have to share Eric, possibly even be "demoted" in her standing with him, from now on. Add to that her recently-acquired knowledge that for over a hundred years, she had been left in the dark about yet another important person in his life, someone who she probably believed she now had to compete with too, and it was no wonder to Eric why things had become so strained between himself and Pam these past few nights. She thought she was losing him, or worse had never even truly had him, and he had done nothing to assure her otherwise.

He should have been more in tune with Pam and helped her understand that he didn't have some sort of ranking of the people he cared about most. She would never be replaced and she didn't need to compete with Nora or Sookie or anyone else who may come along for a spot on that admittedly short list.

But instead of being attentive and aware of his progeny, he'd been absorbed in himself and his own damn problems.

"**I didn't tell you not because you're unimportant to me or because I think you're incapable of looking out for yourself,**" he began gently. "**But I am your maker, and as such I will always have a responsibility to protect you, even if you don't think you need it. If word got out that I was of any importance to Nora, you both would become vulnerable because I would immediately become a target to anyone trying to get to her, as would you because you are of importance to me. That wasn't a risk I was willing to take, so I kept the information to myself.**"

"**I wouldn't have said anything, you know that,**" she replied hoarsely.

"**Not if my life were on the line, and _you_ know that,**" he countered, still speaking softly to her back.

After a few seconds had passed and Pam still hadn't said anything, he spoke again.

"**You know I would do anything to keep you alive, even if you hated me for it. And I know you would do the same for me. I understand that's what you were doing when you stopped Bill from killing me, and even though I'm still angry, that doesn't mean I've stopped caring. Or that I'm not grateful.**"

Eric watched as Pam tried to shift as much as the silver netting would allow. Now that he'd opened himself to their bond again, he could feel her agitation lessen as she let his words sink in.

"**Whatever,**" she finally said, brushing the moment off. And that was the Pam he knew, never the sentimental type. Eric caught himself smiling despite himself. "**There's nothing else I should know about too, is there? No illegitimate leprechaun children or -**"

However, Eric never got a chance to hear what Pam said next, for in the seconds that followed, a number of things happened at once to tear his attention away from his conversation with Pam and onto yet another crisis. He was first hit by an overwhelming wave of fear – a fear that he knew did not belong to him. But before he could react to, or even recover from, the unexpected surge of emotions he'd been subject to, he was hit equally hard by something else: the side of the car as, with a bang, the vehicle rolled onto its side, causing Pam and Eric to roll with it. Hissing in pain as the silver now pressed into new parts of his body, Eric could hear movement outside the car as what he presumed to be bodies were thrown up against it.

What had just happened to them, Eric had no idea. But one thing he did know was the source of the fear. After the blood they'd recently shared, it could only have come from one person: Sookie Stackhouse.

'You have got to be fucking kidding me.'

* * *

**SPOV**

Sookie jumped as the click of someone cocking a gun reverberated through her Gran's kitchen. Slowly closing the refrigerator door and turning around, Sookie found herself staring into the crazed eyes of Debbie Pelt – former-V-addict and girlfriend of Alcide Herveaux (though judging by the rifle aimed at her chest, Sookie was willing to bet there may be an "ex" in there somewhere). Oh fuck.

"Debbie?" Sookie backed to the counter, her hands raised and her voice quivering in panic. "What're you doin'?"

How the hell had Debbie gotten in? Sookie reasoned she couldn't have been here more than two hours. She had checked the time on the dashboard before leaving her car, reading that it was just after 4 am, and knew Tara must have gotten back around 2. Surely Debbie had arrived after Tara or else Tara would have known the she-wolf was here and done something. God, she hoped Tara had heard her come in just now and thought to call the police.

"I should've done this a long time ago," Debbie answered between labored breaths, not once moving the gun from the invisible target at Sookie's heart.

She knew it sounded crazy after all the supernatural shit she'd been through this past year, but Sookie had never been more terrified in her life than she was right now. She supposed that was partially because when she'd been in dangerous, life-threatening situations in the past, she never really had time to get scared as she had been too busy trying to save her own ass. Well, that and the fact that in the past, she'd always had a vampire or two she could count on for back-up. But right now, she was all alone and she knew Debbie was only seconds away from pulling that trigger.

She couldn't believe this. She'd survived the Fellowship, a serial killer, a maenad, a resurrected witch and Russell Edgington only to be killed by a werewolf with a shot-gun in her kitchen. She was sure someone, somewhere was gonna get a right kick out of that.

But just then, Sookie's eyes were torn away from Debbie's gun as the sound of someone screaming her name filled her ears.

Tara, no! She was supposed to call the police!

Before she could do anything, Tara ran at her, pushing her aside at the exact moment Debbie's finger fired the gun. Horrified, Sookie watched Tara's head fly to the side from the force of the impact the bullet had made when it grazed her skull. Glass shattering everywhere, Sookie screamed for her friend, but there was nothing she could do. So instead, she directed her attention to a stunned Debbie, taking her chance and tackling Debbie to the ground with all the strength she could muster. She had managed to get the advantage over Debbie, whose head Sookie could hear was still reeling from what had just transpired.

For a few frantic seconds, they both fumbled, each trying to gain (or in Debbie's case, regain) the upper hand when Sookie flung her elbow at Debbie's chin, giving her the precious seconds she needed to grab the gun Debbie had dropped and pull back the hammer.

Lodging it in the space between Debbie's head and throat, Sookie stared into the now-fear-filled eyes of her opponent as she pleaded for her life.

She had the gun now. She could just put it down, let Debbie live and call the police so they could put the bitch in jail. But then Sookie caught sight of the ever-growing puddle of red on the floor and she lost it. This was the woman who had shot Tara in the head. This was the were-bitch who'd nearly drained Bill dry and broken Alcide's heart. This was the person who had knocked down her bedroom door and attempted to destroy her under Russell Edgington's watch. And if Sookie knew one thing, it was that Debbie Pelt was not going to hurt her or the people she cared about one more time.

So she pulled the trigger.

Now it was Sookie's turn to stare in alarm at what she had done. Screaming, she dropped the offending gun from her hands and scrambled to get away from the corpse of Debbie Pelt, refusing to look at what remained of her head. Rushing instead towards Tara, Sookie collected her friend in her arms. She heard somebody yelling, unaware that it was actually she who was screaming, crying out Tara's name in a useless attempt to bring life back to her friend.

"Please, somebody help!" she sobbed. "Please… Somebody please help us!"

But it was no use. Nobody came, and though Sookie didn't want to admit it to herself, she knew on some level that her childhood friend was gone. Tara Thornton was dead.

* * *

**A/N: So, I know that up till now, things have remained pretty similar to how they happened in Seasons 4 and 5 on True Blood. But from here on out, the story is going to diverge from the show much more noticeably. **

**Also, I want to thank you all for being so patient with me, and I hope you don't mind being even more so now because this next month is going to be crazy for me. I've been trying to churn out a chapter a week, but I'm afraid that's going to have to change with either this up-coming chapter or the one after. I would like to get chapter four out before next weekend if I can because after that I'm going to have project after prelim after project after prelim up until Thanksgiving, and I don't want to leave you all hanging for a month or more. But we're just going to have to see how that goes. Like I said in the A/N in chapter one, I have no intention of abandoning this story, so even if takes me a while to get the next update out there, I promise you it is coming and I will be working on it whenever I can.**

**Well, that's all for now. Happy Halloween and thanks again for reading :) I'd love to hear your comments! **


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Hey everyone! How've you all been? I'm so sorry it took me this long to update! I've been really busy and sadly, writing had to take a back-seat, but I'm still here and I have a new chapter for you all. It's a long one, MUCH longer than my usual. Think of it as my thank-you to everyone for sticking with me :) Anyway, I hope to get Chapter 5 out soon and not make you all wait as long as you did for Chapter 4. I hope you enjoy this chapter and would love to hear your thoughts :)**

****I also want to say a special thank you to kleannhouse for pointing out that the BT police officer's name is Kenya, not Kendra as I had originally written. Thanks for catching that :)**

* * *

**SPOV**

Sookie didn't know how long she sat on the cold, wet tiles of the kitchen floor, clutching Tara's body to her chest surrounded by broken glass and blood. It couldn't have been longer than a minute or two, but to her, it felt like a lifetime. As it was, she saw everything she knew of Tara's flash in front of her eyes before she heard Lafayette's voice break through her daze and call her back to reality.

"Sook? What the fuck is you doin' down he- No, no, no, no, no…"

Sookie looked up to see Lafayette practically fall down the stairs in his rush to get to Tara.

"Tara! Shit Tara, baby girl, don't you do this. Don't you fuckin' do this to me. Not now," he cried, dropping to his knees and carefully taking hold of Tara's head to give it a little shake. "Tara! C'mon, jus' wake up. Please! Just wake the fuck up!"

But Tara's eyelids did not flutter open, nor did her lips part to take a giant, miraculous gulp of air. The moment Lafayette let her head go, it only flopped lifelessly to the side, making Sookie feel suddenly nauseous.

Concentrating hard on keeping whatever food she'd eaten down in her stomach, Sookie was startled when Lafayette abruptly turned to her, a harrowing combination of anger and anguish in his eyes.

"How?"

"Wh-what?" Sookie stuttered in response.

"How? How the fuck did this happen to her?" he yelled, making her give an involuntary flinch.

Sookie paled as the memory of those few fateful minutes – if it had even been more than one – played back in her head as vividly as if they were happening to her again right now. She didn't want to talk about it, or even think about it really. Not yet, it was still too soon and besides, how was she supposed to put to words what had just happened?

Lafayette, however, was not going to wait; that much was obvious. She could see in his eyes the need to know why his cousin was getting colder by the second, and if anyone had a right to hear her story tonight, it was Lafayette. She had to try.

"It was Debbie Pelt, that werewolf from Jackson," she shakily began. "She was here, waiting for me. I should've known she was here. I should've checked. I should've reckoned that something in this fucking supernatural world was gonna be after me, but I didn't. And she had a gun and every intention of killing me."

Sookie stopped, the reminder of what _should_ have happened next strangling her into momentary silence.

"It should've been me," she all but sobbed, averting her gaze to the floor. "I should've been the one Debbie killed, but Tara got in the way. She took the bullet and…" Sookie trailed off, unable to either finish her story or look Lafayette in the eye.

She didn't need telepathy to know what he was thinking, but she was too afraid of being right to read his mind and see for sure. He was blaming her. Either that, or he was damn well disgusted by what she had done to Debbie in retaliation. Who was to say he wasn't feeling both? She knew she was.

As the minutes passed, Sookie continued to stare wide-eyed at the ground, her gaze focused on the point where Debbie's spilled blood was beginning to seep into Tara's. She still couldn't bring herself to look at the mangled she-wolf's body, or more specifically at the damage she'd done to it.

It wasn't that she felt sorry for Debbie. As far as she was concerned, Debbie Pelt had asked for what she got the moment she showed up in her home with a rifle. But that wasn't to say Sookie didn't feel horrified at the reality of what she herself was capable of doing to Debbie.

She'd never thought of herself as a killer. Sure, she'd technically killed before and those deaths had had their own effect on her, but killing Rene and Lorena had been acts of pure self-defense. She'd tried just knocking Rene out and letting the police handle the rest, but he just wouldn't accept defeat and ultimately left her with no other choice but to drive a shovel through his neck. She'd also tried to simply ignore Lorena, had fooled herself into believing Godric's banishment would actually rid her of Bill's maker forever. But Lorena was a wildcard that could not be safely ignored or left to some higher authority to handle – Godric and Russell had both proven that. She'd had to kill Lorena because if she hadn't, Lorena sure as hell would have killed her.

Debbie, however, was a different story. There, Sookie _did_ have a choice. She could have put down the gun and called for help. Unlike Lorena, jail _would_ have been enough to subdue Debbie. Sookie had had entire seconds to consider her options before reaching a decision, and in the end, she'd decided to kill without mercy. And that knowledge was now scaring her even more than Debbie had.

Catching a sudden movement from the corner of her eye, Sookie was startled out of her thoughts by Lafayette, who had stood and walked to the opposite end of the room before she realized where he was going.

"What're you doing?!" she asked frantically, Lafayette's hand already on the receiver of her kitchen phone.

"Callin' the cops," he answered, picking it up and preparing to dial without so much as pausing at Sookie's interruption.

"What?! No!" Sookie blurted out in alarm, scrambling to her feet and rushing to Lafayette before his finger could press the 9.

He gave her a bewildered look, but at least she'd gotten his full attention.

"My cousin is dead in yo' kitchen because somebody shot her clean through the head," he explained, gesturing angrily at Tara's body. "I'm callin' the cops."

"And Debbie Pelt is dead in my kitchen because I shot _her_ clean through the head," Sookie countered, desperate for Lafayette to see why he couldn't call for help.

"So? Bitch deserved it," he said coldly, the words feeling like a slap in the face to Sookie.

Yeah, she was sure that'd go over real well with Kenya.

"And you can tell 'em it was self-defense. They ain't gonna arrest your ass if that's what you're worried about," he added, already turning back to the phone.

But Sookie quickly snatched it from his grasp before he could do anything. With the phone now in her hand, the busy signal rang louder in her ears, only adding to the buzzing that was already in her head.

Trying not to dwell on _why_ it was that she couldn't just do as Lafayette said and let him make the call, Sookie looked him hard in the eye and repeated adamantly, "No. We have to keep this quiet. No police."

To her relief, Lafayette listened, or at the very least he refrained from simply ignoring her and reclaiming the phone to complete his call. Taking this as a sign of victory, Sookie relaxed, if only for a moment. Since they weren't calling the police, there was still the issue of what to do next.

She and Lafayette couldn't get rid of the bodies themselves. Or rather, they couldn't just drag _Tara_ out to the cemetery and bury her in the dead of night like that. The thought alone was infuriating; her friend deserved better, way better.

They needed help. Or really, _she_ needed help seeing as how Lafayette hadn't actually done anything wrong and could walk away from the situation whenever he chose. But help from whom? She'd already established that the police were most definitely out of the question.

And then it hit her.

"We need to call Jason."

To her surprise, Lafayette's expression quickly contorted from grief to irritation at her suggestion.

"Have you done lost your damn mind? Sook, I know he's yo' brother but if what you want is to keep this shit quiet, calling Jason Stackhouse is not the fucking answer. Trust me."

Standing a little straighter, Sookie could feel her patience deplete considerably with every word Lafayette said, and it wasn't like she'd had a lot of the quality to begin with. What right did he have to doubt Jason now, when she, his own sister, thought Jason could be helpful? To be real honest, she was sick and tired of everyone always talking down to her about her brother and as it was, she was under enough stress already thanks to the events that had recently transpired in her kitchen. So she was in no mood to fight Lafayette on their every next move.

"Well then what do you suppose we do, because I've got nothing," she bit back testily. "And _don't_ say 'call the cops', Lafayette or I swear…"

"I can't believe I'm fucking saying this, but why don't you call someone who'll actually be of use to us?" he snapped at her.

Sookie took a step back.

"And what is that supposed to mean?" she asked suspiciously, not liking the implication of his words.

Lafayette rolled his eyes before giving her an answer.

"Call one of yo' goddamn vampire-fuck-buddies."

Her mouth dropped open in equal parts shock and indignation.

She spluttered, "They're not fuck- "

"Sook, I'm sorry but I don't give a damn what you think they are," Lafayette cut her short before she could go off on him about something that, in that moment, really didn't matter as much as Sookie thought it did. "What I care about is my dead cousin on yo' lap and what a dead werewolf means for our futures. If you won't call the cops to report this shit, then fucking call someone who actually knows how to clean it up."

Sookie could only stare at him in disbelief and a bit of betrayal. Honestly, the only thing that could make her situation worse right now would be the involvement of Eric or Bill. She wanted to keep her problems nice and separate to deal with one at a time, not pile them all together to create an even bigger mess.

"I'm not calling them," she said stubbornly, trying to block any further thoughts on Eric and Bill from her head, both foreign and internally born.

"Why the hell not? How many people do you know who's covering up murders 'round here? 'Cause the only ones I know are them vamps."

_'__And Jason,'_ Sookie thought, remembering what he'd confided in her about Eggs. But Lafayette didn't know about that and she wasn't going to be the one to tell him. Still, the fact remained that her brother had experience in covering up a big murder, something she could really use a lot of right now.

"I'm calling Jason," she asserted, making it clear from her tone that she was putting an end to this discussion.

Lafayette, however, didn't seem to care.

"Jesus fuckin' Christ, Sook! Did you hear nothing of what I just said to you?" he exclaimed.

"I did, and I'm not calling them," Sookie repeated, refusing to budge. Seeing that Lafayette still wasn't sold, she sighed and explained, "Look, Jason can help. He's part of the police so he's bound to have learned something and maybe he'll know what to do about Debbie and Tara."

Which was the most she could say on Jason's behalf without spilling the beans on Eggs.

Holding her breath, she waited for Lafayette's reaction. She had the phone, so she technically didn't need him to agree with her, but for whatever reason, she felt she needed his go-ahead before she could make the call to Jason. Perhaps she just wanted reassurance that someone thought her quasi-plan wasn't a bad one before she went through with it.

"I thought you didn't want no police. You said yo'self, Jason is part of the fucking police," Lafayette argued, but Sookie could already hear the slight sway in his voice.

She mentally crossed her fingers before responding gently, "And he's also my brother. My brother may be a lot of things, but if there's one thing I know, it's that when it comes to Jason, blood always comes first. He'll help us and he won't blab."

Sookie could practically see the thoughts flying through Lafayette's head (and technically, she could hear them if she wanted) as he stared, first at her and then at Tara. They were quiet for a minute, Sookie waiting anxiously to see what Lafayette would say.

_'Please say yes...'_

"Fine," he finally consented, his eyes still trained on Tara.

That was all Sookie needed. Letting out the breath she'd been holding, she wasted no time punching in Jason's number. To her surprise, he answered on the first ring. Actually, scratch that. It was Halloween night. It should come as no surprise to her that Jason was still up this late.

"Jason, I need you to come over. Like, right now."

* * *

Sookie jumped at the sound of a heavy fist pounding on her door. '_Oh God,_' she silently prayed. '_Please don't be the police. Please don't be the police…_' But to her utter relief, it was Jason's voice she heard calling out to her from the outside, not Andy Bellefleur's.

"Sook? Look, I'm here now, so will you please just tell me what the fuck is goin' on? Also, you should know I brought-"

Sookie ran to the door, all but throwing it open in her anxiety.

"Jess…" he trailed off, staring at her in shock.

The hell?

"Jason, why is Jess here?" she asked at the exact moment he said, "Holy shit, Sook! What the hell happened to ya?"

Turning to look at Jessica, her brother quickly explained, "Oh, well she was crashin' at my place and when I told her how freaked you sounded on the phone, she said she wanted to come too. But what the fuck is goin' on, Sook?" he asked again, bringing the conversation and his attention back to her. "Why're you covered in blood?"

Sookie barely even had time to open her mouth before she was interrupted.

"Oh hell no."

Lafayette was marching angrily towards the three of them huddled at the door, his eyes on Jess.

"You's gots to leave," he pointed to Jessica. "Sook, what the hell did I tell ya about callin' Jason? He couldn't even keep his fucking mouth shut for five goddamn minutes," he rounded on her.

"Hey!" Jason exclaimed indignantly, taking a dramatic step forward. "S'not my fault I had company. Y'all asked me to come, and I came. Nobody said nothin' 'bout keeping Jess out of it."

"Look, I can just leave if y'all don't want me here," Jess interjected, her hands raised in surrender. "But you should know Steve Newlin's a vampire now and he's after Jason, so if I were you, I'd be real careful about wandering around by yourselves at night," she added in warning.

Hold up, Steve Newlin? Sookie shook her head. Twenty five years. Twenty five years she'd lived her life without any excitement or craziness and now, the universe was dumping a boat-load of problems on her in just one night.

"No, Jess. You can stay," she conceded wearily, putting a halt to the chaos at her door and stashing Jessica's news away for later. She had more important things to deal with right now than a recently-turned former-Reverend.

At this, Lafayette shot her an incredulous look which Sookie determinedly returned. This was her home (well, sort of) and her mess, and the more she thought about, the more she realized that Lafayette may have been on to something earlier. Having a vampire around to help didn't sound like such a bad idea. After all, in the past she did always have… no, she wasn't going to think about that now.

Throwing up his hands in defeat, Lafayette backed away to the other side of the room, muttering something about how he "ain't doin' this right now". Having finally gotten that settled, Sookie stepped aside to let Jason and Jessica in.

As Jason entered the house and walked through the first floor, Sookie nervously followed her brother, waiting for him to reach the only room that mattered. It wasn't long before his eyes shot towards the kitchen, zeroing in on the blood dripping from what remained of her cabinet doors. She watched with baited breath as Jason's pace quickened and he dashed to the crime scene to examine the damage she'd left behind.

"Holy shit, Tara…" he said upon discovering her lying in a puddle of blood.

He hurried to kneel beside her without a second's hesitation, his hand reaching out to gently cup her face.

"Fuck, what happened to you?" he whispered, brushing a few sticky hairs from her forehead.

Tears blurred Sookie's vision as her brother cried for the girl who was practically a sister to him (heck for all Sookie knew, Tara may have even been something more to Jason once upon a time). Jason's reaction alone was breaking her heart and the guilt she felt for being the reason behind Tara's state was beginning to suffocate her.

"Oh crap," she heard Jessica say from behind her.

She jumped in surprise before slowly moved out of the doorway to allow Jess to see the full scene too. Not a second later, Sookie heard the telltale click of Jess' fangs popping out at the sight (and smell, Sookie presumed) of blood.

"Sookie, what happened?" the red-head breathed through the hand she'd clapped to her mouth.

And so, Sookie launched for the second time that night into the story of how she'd come home to find Debbie Pelt waiting for her in the kitchen. It was taking everything she had to get through it this time around, and to be honest, she wasn't entirely sure Jason even heard a single word of it. That was until she saw him turn to examine the rest of the room, his eyes finally landing on the second body in her kitchen.

"You did that?" he nodded at Debbie, his voice distant and his eyebrows raised in amazement.

She said nothing. After all, what was she supposed to say? She'd already confessed to Jason, what else did he want to hear?

"Fuck Sook, why didn't you call someone? Call Andy and report it or something?" he said weakly, echoing Lafayette's sentiment from earlier.

Lord have mercy, she couldn't go through this again.

"I can't call Andy," she said in a voice so low, it was practically a whisper.

"You're not gonna go to jail, it was self-defense. He'll know that. He knows you," he tried reasoning with her, thinking he was calming her.

But on the contrary, Jason's words, like Lafayette's before him, only made her feel worse because clearly, Andy did not know her if he thought she wasn't capable of cold-blooded murder. Neither did Jason or Lafayette for that matter.

"No," she repeated, more firmly this time and begging for him to just accept her answer.

But Jason, like his sister, was stubborn as a mule and was not about to do any such thing.

"Why not?" he persisted.

"Because, Jason, it wasn't self-defense. Okay?" she snapped at him, having had enough of bottling up her thoughts on the matter and finally letting them spill. "I had a choice. I had her pinned down, I didn't have to shoot, but I did anyway. And I can't just lie and pretend I didn't. The truth is already eating me up," she confessed, taking a deep breath.

"I murdered Debbie Pelt. That's the truth. I'm pretty sure part of her brain is on my fridge and her blood is on my face, but for some bizarre reason I really don't want to check. And speaking of things I really don't want to do, I am terrified of going to prison for this.

"And yes Jason, I am perfectly well aware that Tara died taking a bullet that was meant for me. And before you start thinking about how I'm a terrible friend and a shitty human being for letting yet another person die over me, well I already know that, so there's no need.

"Now, I have no idea what I'm supposed to do next. I can't just bury Tara out in the cemetery that's basically my backyard and as I've already explained, I can't call Andy or Kenya either. I mean even if I did, how the hell am I supposed to explain to them that this all happened because I was being hunted down by a crazy werewolf on V who thought I was stealing her werewolf boyfriend when all he was trying to do was save me from a possessed witch?

"But I did call _someone_, Jason – I called you. So if you're done gawking at me, I could really use your help right about now."

By the time Sookie had finished her little outburst, her chest was heaving and her cheeks were streaming with yet more tears. She hadn't meant to go off on a rant, but once she'd gotten going, the words had just come pouring out of her. Everyone was staring, Lafayette and Jessica perhaps a little warily, and Sookie suddenly felt like the weight of the world was crashing over her entire body.

"Whoa, hey Sook. It's okay. I ain't judging." Jason scrambled to his feet to stand before Sookie. "If you don't want to call the police, then we won't."

As he gripped her arms to steady her and looked hard into her eyes, Sookie stared back into her brother's face intently, as if concentrating on him hard enough would save her from this situation she'd gotten herself into.

Moving his hands over her arms in an attempt to soothe her racing heart, Jason softly added, "We'll figure this out. 'Kay?"

Good Lord, he was gonna make her cry even harder. She didn't know why she was placing so much trust in Jason's assurances – actually when all was said and done, she really had no reason to – but she did anyway. Right now, what she needed more than anything was someone to lean on, someone she could unload some of this craziness on to, and Jason was proving to be that person. Maybe it was just because of her highly emotional state, but the fact that he was there and ready to support her meant the world to her at that moment.

Swallowing back the lump in her throat, Sookie nodded.

"Okay." Jason gave her a small, reassuring smile before straightening up to look around the kitchen, rubbing his hand over his chin. "Okay," he repeated. "Well first thing's first, we've gotta get rid of…" he gestured to the body Sookie was still refusing to so much as look at.

"Debbie?" she offered.

"Yeah, Debbie's body."

"Oh well thank the heavens we have you," Lafayette muttered, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "I could've told us that."

Okay, well someone obviously still had issues with reaching out to Jason.

Holding up his hand to stop Lafayette, Jason responded, "Hold your horses, I'm getting to it."

"Well how 'bouts you get to it a little faster, Jason, hmm?" Lafayette shot back, his patience with Jason running thin.

His head whipping around in Lafayette's direction having finally picked up on the hostility there, Jason now directed his full attention at him.

Lord above, were they seriously going to start a fight _now_?

"Hey, how 'bout you show me a little more respect." Jason stalked towards Lafayette.

Yep, apparently they were. And just like that, Sookie snapped out of her overly-sensitive state, feeling a bit more like her normal self as she did.

"I am an officer of the law –"

"Jesus Christ, Shepherd of Judea!" she exclaimed, putting an end to their little showdown before it could even really begin.

She couldn't listen to this bullshit a second longer.

"Lafayette, let Jason speak. And Jason? Ideas? Now, please."

She looked sternly at the both of them. Lafayette rolled his eyes, but eventually stepped back signaling he would, at the very least, give Jason an actual chance.

"Right," Jason stated, getting back on track. "We need to get rid of Debbie and clean this place up. Erase any evidence that she was here and that anything happened. As for – as for Tara…" he stopped, swallowing uncomfortably before continuing in a quieter, more subdued tone, "we could call the station after we get rid of Debbie and say… I dunno, that someone broke in and shot Tara before taking off? And we'll just have to pray Andy believes our story and doesn't look too far into it. Or, we could move Tara someplace else and make an anonymous call so emergency response will find her."

As he finished listing his ideas, Jason nervously met Sookie's eyes. Honestly, she wasn't crazy about either one. Both options felt disrespectful in their own right to Tara's sacrifice and death. Her friend gave her life to protect her and she deserved to be recognized for that. But Sookie couldn't give that to her friend without telling the police the whole story, and doing so now could possibly incriminate not only her, but Jason, Lafayette and Jessica as well. Not to mention the impossible-to-explain circumstances surrounding the two deaths and the impossible-to-shake guilt and panic Sookie felt every time she thought about Debbie and Tara.

Sookie supposed some of this must have shown on her face, for her brother seemed to have picked up on what was causing her to hesitate.

"Look Sook, I know you're not crazy about this," he began. "I don't like it either, but this is the best I can come up with, so you have to pick one. I can keep an eye on the case they're gonna have on Tara and make sure nothing gets traced back to you or Debbie, but we're gonna have to act fast, especially if we go with option one or else they'll notice Tara's been dead for almost an hour already."

He was right. She had no other choice but to go along with Jason's plan. It was the best one they had and when it came down to it, Sookie knew she'd probably feel anything they came up with would fail to be good enough for Tara Thornton. So she nodded to show she understood and a temporary silence fell over the room.

"Hey, if it helps, I could always create a crime scene to fit Tara's death," Jessica said tentatively. Everyone's eyes fell on her and realizing that nobody was going to shoot her down, she stepped to the center of the group and elaborated. "Bill told me about how vampires used to do stuff like that to cover up accidental drainings before they came out of the coffin, and I think I could pull it off."

At this, Sookie glanced at Lafayette, the two of them sharing a look and silently agreeing that while they didn't like it, this was the best they could do.

Still not breaking eye contact, Sookie nodded again. "Alright. I think it'd be safest to stage Tara's death somewhere else. The fewer connections there are between Tara and Debbie, the better." Turning to Jessica with an apologetic look, Sookie added, "Umm… Jess? D'you think you could –"

"I'm on it Sookie."

Jess smiled softly at her, telling her without words that it was okay and the favor she had been about to ask was not a problem at all. Sadly returning the smile, Sookie was overcome by a wave of exhaustion. Today had been a long one, and she was beginning to feel like a ping-pong ball with all the hits her emotional and physical state had taken in such a short amount of time. Unfortunately for her, the night was still far from over, as Lafayette was so kindly about to remind her.

"And what about our big, bad, headless wolf over here?" he asked, standing over Debbie, hatred and disgusted etched on every inch of his face.

Before she had time to talk herself out of it, Sookie lowered her gaze to look, for the first time, at Debbie's body. Her heart thudded to a halt at the sight and the desire to retch immediately found its way back into Sookie's system.

She'd done that. The mess that was Debbie Pelt's corpse was her doing and as she stared at the physical reminder of just how dark her darkest part could be, those words ran through her head in a continuous loop, putting Sookie in a near-trance. For as horrifying an image and as disturbing a thought as that was, she found that she couldn't look away.

Realizing that Sookie wasn't about to say anything any time soon, Jason cut in, saving her from having to provide an answer to Lafayette.

"I can take the body. There's a lake a couple miles up from here, I'll just-"

"No," Sookie said without thinking, her eyes still stuck on Debbie. Her words were automatic. "The best place to get rid of a body is in a freshly dug grave. The ground's already been disturbed, so nobody will think to dig it up again."

After a moment's silence, Sookie finally tore her eyes from Debbie, aware of everyone else's eyes on her. A second later, and she froze, having remembered the source of those valuable words of wisdom.

"Now how the hell did you know that?" Lafayette asked in astonishment.

Pushing away the image of another dead werewolf whose body she'd disposed of from this very house, Sookie swallowed hard before meeting the stares of her friends.

"That doesn't matter," she answered, putting on her 'hard-brave-and-in-control-Sookie' face despite what was going on behind the mask. "Jason, you said yourself we need to act fast. So everyone stop staring at me already and get to it. Jess, you take Tara, and Jason, you take Debbie. Lafayette and I will stay here and clean the blood. That way if anyone drops by, we'll both be here like we're supposed to. Okay?"

Well, at least she'd succeeded in distracting them from Lafayette's question.

As Jessica and Jason began to move the bodies and Lafayette went out back to get the mop, Sookie finally let her mind wander to the vampire whose advice she was currently taking. Eric and Bill's absence tonight hadn't gone unnoticed by Sookie, and she supposed she couldn't blame them for not running to her rescue. She herself had already made clear that she didn't want to drag them into this. But she'd also be lying to herself if she said she wasn't a little stung that neither of them had come to even check that she was okay. Selfish and unfair, she knew, but she'd sort of grown used to at least one of them always popping up whenever she was scared or in danger. It wasn't until now that Sookie began to truly realize she may have lost them both forever.

* * *

**EPOV**

**"****Hello, brother."**

"Nora," Eric smiled tightly in greeting, fighting to keep both the pain from the burns and the sudden despair he felt through Sookie from showing on his face. In the minute that he and Pam had waited in the toppled car, Sookie's emotions had switched from panic and fear to overwhelming sorrow, leaving Eric with no idea as to what could have caused the abrupt change.

"Everything going well, I see," she smirked down at him as he lay, still trapped by silver, in the trunk of the SUV, quite obviously enjoying his current predicament and taking no notice of his internal turmoil.

"Wonderful," he answered dryly. He was beginning to remember why he almost never gave his blood to humans in the first place; the last thing he needed on a night-to-night basis was their emotions mixing with his, especially when he was in situations like this one. "Nothing like the feel of burning flesh on my bones in the early morning."

And lucky him, for he was getting a lot of that tonight.

"Speak for yourself. Tell Margaret Thatcher over there that if she doesn't get this shit off me in the next five seconds, I will personally ensure she spends the rest of her days bald and toothless in a forgotten cell somewhere in Britain," Pam threatened, already bored with their banter and impatient to get out of the car.

At this, Nora moved to look past Eric, a more genuine smile gracing her features despite the hostile words directed at her.

"Pamela, I don't believe I've had the pleasure," she greeted warmly.

He rolled his eyes. His sister really had a knack for choosing the worst time to 'meet the family'.

"Yes, shame we couldn't keep it that way," Pam muttered bitterly in return.

Always the charmer. Then again for Pam, that had been downright nice.

Catching Eric's eye, Nora lifted an eyebrow in mild amusement before finally complying with Pam's wishes and extending a gloved hand to remove the silver from their bodies. The second the metal was lifted, he and Pam wasted no time speeding out of the trunk, the cool night air a welcome change from that of the stuffy car and the burns on their skin instantly beginning to heal.

While Pam busied herself with re-adjusting her outfit, Eric's eyes followed Nora as she slowly brushed past. With a glance at Pam, she quietly taunted, "Your taste in women is really quite extraordinary, Eric."

Eric had to bite back a chuckle. Well, if she insisted on going there.

Not missing a beat, he bent to murmur back, "Yes, and let's not forget whose extraordinary taste in women is to thank for your long-extended life, my dear sister."

And to his satisfaction, Nora spared a moment to shoot him a dirty look - which he returned with a smirk of his own - before she moved to stand in front of him and Pam. Time had only proven that fucking with his sister never got old. In many, many ways.

"Right, so I'm sure you're both wondering why you're here," Nora began, snatching Pam's attention away from her ruined clothes and onto her.

It was clear from Pam's expression that she was still extremely pissed off, though for once tonight, her rage wasn't directed at him or even Sookie, which was honestly something of a relief. She crossed her arms over her chest and waited expectantly for Nora to explain.

Meanwhile, now that Nora was no longer speaking solely to him, Eric's thoughts had slowly crept back to the other issue nagging at every drop of his blood: Sookie. At this point, doing so hadn't even been a conscious decision on his part; over time, the act had become an involuntary reflex (and annoying habit) that only heightened in frequency when her emotions did. And as per usual, once his thoughts had returned to her, he was having difficulty jerking them away again, even as Nora began her explanation.

"Well to keep it brief, Nan Flanagan was sent tonight to terminate Eric and Bill. The Guardian wanted someone to keep an eye on her and, seeing my opportunity to save Eric, I took the job. It appears, however, that Nan and Bill have vanished. We believe they are together, most likely plotting against the Authority at this very moment, but the point remains that the case with Mr. Compton is now out of my hands. A pity, but to be perfectly honest, he wasn't my priority. You were," she said, with a meaningful look at Eric.

So, Bill had taken off with Nan and allied himself against the Authority with her. That could only end badly. If he actually gave two shits about Bill Compton, he'd be worried. But on the contrary, as far as he was concerned, Bill's disappearance only meant the former-king was now finally out of his hair.

The Authority being after him and Pam, however, was actually of concern to him. If the Vampire Authority wanted him dead, then he had a serious problem on his hands.

Yet even with this news, Eric's head was still only half-in the conversation.

"After Nan was reported to have 'gone rogue', I was ordered to bring you to the Authority myself. I am sorry for the kidnapping by the way, but it was a necessity to keep any suspicions about Eric and my relationship at bay. Nobody at the Authority knows we are connected, and I'd like to keep it that way," Nora went on, apologizing mainly for Pam's sake.

But Pam never really was the type to forgive and forget, at least not so easily. He should know. And tonight was to be no exception.

"Oh goody, an apology. Now all can be forgiven for spoiling a perfectly good night and a brand new set of clothes," Pam grumbled, loud enough for them all to hear but quiet enough for Nora to ignore if she chose, which she did. Catching Eric's eye and spotting the amusement on his face, Pam grinned at him, shrugging appreciatively.

"I then arranged for our car to be ambushed on an otherwise-quiet road," Nora continued, paying no attention to either of them. "Our attackers were ordered to take out my driver and leave, so we are alone. Now, I need you two to listen to me very carefully."

But Eric's mind had already begun to wander. He hated that he still gave a damn, but he could feel Sookie's emotions pulsing through him with their abnormal intensity, distracting him from the task at hand. He knew Sookie Stackhouse and if there was one thing she was good at, it was getting herself into dangerous, life-threatening situations over incredibly stupid (yet admittedly noble) reasons. And even though her fear had gone, Eric was convinced that there was still a very real chance she was in trouble. But short of just taking off, there was nothing he could do to help her – if he even _should_.

"You have to go into hiding, both of you."

Alright, now he was listening. Eric's eyes narrowed, the heavy warning in Nora's voice finally capturing his full attention.

"The Authority cannot know either of you are still alive, especially you Eric, or it'll be the end of all of us. I have passports and papers with your new identities and have secured a place in Nova Scotia for you to stay for the time being. I've also arranged for transportation to take you from Canada to a location in the French countryside a month from now where you are to hide out for the next few decades at the very least."

"Looks like I'm getting my all-expense paid trip to Paris after all," Pam smirked, hand on hip. Apparently now that France was on the table, all _was_ forgiven.

But this time, Eric paid her no attention. He was hardly even listening to what Nora was saying, which was probably a mistake because it was pretty damn important. His head was spinning, Nora's words about leaving it all behind having been the tipping point, forcing him to make a fast decision on what he was going to do about Sookie.

"Under no circumstances are either of you to ever return to America or your lives here," Nora warned, unaware that she was only losing Eric more with every word she said. "Not tomorrow, not ten years from now, not three-hundred years from now. When I say your very existence is dependent on it, I mean it. Do you understand?"

Yes, he understood and he'd also had enough with the mental game of tug-of-war he'd been playing with himself since getting out of the car. 'Should he go, should he stay?' Even when she was all these miles away, Sookie still found a way to get under his skin.

Without warning, Eric grabbed Pam's arm and pulled her aside.

"Eric! Where the bloody hell are you going?" Nora called after him, bewildered as she watched the pair walk away.

But he ignored her, concentrating instead on his irate progeny. "Pam, I need you to listen to me and not argue. Go with Nora and go without me," he commanded.

"What? Are you insane?" Pam hissed as she yanked her arm out of his grip and crossed it over her chest with the other one. He might as well have not even bothered with the 'don't argue' part.

Eric was already well aware that this was one of his more reckless ideas, he didn't need Pam to tell him that. But he couldn't abandon Louisiana for good knowing that he'd left Sookie in a potentially life-threatening situation and done nothing about it. He'd only be gone one extra night. Just one night to check on her, and _then_ he would heed Nora's warning and take off.

"You heard her, Eric, you can't stay here. The Authority are after _you_ and if anybody sees or reports that you're still alive, we're all going to die," Pam persisted.

"I understand that, and I'll be careful," he assured her, glancing over her shoulder to see Nora glaring furiously back at him. He was always careful, especially when it came to Pam and Nora. "But there are things I need to see to here-"

"I swear to God if this is about Sookie…" she groaned, cutting him off.

One look at his face, and she had her answer. For a second, all she could do was stare at him in what Eric guessed to be utter amazement at his stupidity.

"Fucking hell, Eric. How many times do you need to almost-die for this girl before you realize she's no good for you?" Pam said, throwing down her arms in exasperation over what she liked to call his 'fixation on the infestation'. "Honestly, just do the world and yourself a favor already and leave the bitch to solve her own goddamn problems."

Eric gave her a withering look and, shaking his head, turned to walk away. He didn't have time for this. He thought they'd gotten past this crap, but apparently not and he wasn't going to waste any more precious minutes arguing about Sookie with Pam _again_.

Before he could take a step however, Pam hastily reached for his arm, forcing him to wait.

Sighing as if to say she couldn't believe she was even bothering, she asked, "Is she in any immediate danger?"

Eric said nothing, but he didn't continue walking either, Pam's question having had the intended effect on him.

'Is she in any immediate danger?' He didn't know, but for the first time since getting out of the car, Eric paused to take a second to reevaluate the situation with a new sense of clarity and honesty with himself.

If Sookie were actually in danger, he'd be receiving a very different mix of emotions than what he was getting now. She'd been in danger enough times for him to know. Instead of the panic, fear and will-to-survive that he'd felt earlier, all he could sense from her at the moment was extreme sadness, and truth be told, that could be because of anything.

So was she in any immediate danger?

Maybe.

Probably not.

No.

Correctly interpreting the meaning of his silence, Pam pleaded, "Then for once, put yourself ahead of Tinker Bell and take Nora's offer to save your ass. I'm not an idiot. I know Sookie broke things off with you, and if what she wants is you out of her life, then you can't keep running back to her every time she needs a goddamn tissue."

He knew she was right. If Sookie's life were undoubtedly at risk right now, it'd be a different story. But it wasn't and if he went back, he'd be putting not only his own life on the line, but Pam's and Nora's as well for no good reason.

Besides, Sookie craved normalcy. She wanted her porch filled with kids and grandkids, not werewolves or vampires or, more specifically, him. It was time for him to accept that and move forward with his life.

Maybe this "banishment" was actually a blessing in disguise.

Pulling free from Pam's grasp, Eric marched straight to Nora without once turning back, his mind made up but every inch of his body visibly unhappy with his decision.

"Fine. We understand," he said curtly, as if he hadn't just stormed away in the middle of their conversation.

"What the hell was that about? Who's Sookie?" Nora angrily demanded in a low voice, stepping forward and completely disregarding his response.

"Nothing and nobody you need to concern yourself about," Eric answered, swiftly shutting her down.

He waited tensely as she studied him, trying to decide if she should keep pushing or let it drop. Not that it really mattered which she chose, Eric wasn't going to elaborate on anything either way. But he didn't have the patience right now to play out the inevitable dance of questions and elusive answers that would follow any further inquiries on Nora's part.

After a long minute, she finally came to a decision.

"Alright then," she said, and Eric mentally thanked Godric for giving his sister the good sense to back down. She took a step back, disgruntled at not getting answers but already putting his little episode behind them. "I'm going to need you to hand over your phones and any other technology you might have on you," she continued in a louder voice, looking expectantly at both Eric and Pam, who had just reappeared at his side.

"There won't be any need for that. My phone is untraceable," Eric dismissed quickly.

"And I'm not taking any chances," Nora countered. "My life is on the line here too. So, phones. Now."

She extended a hand, waiting. One look at his sister and Eric knew she was serious. So reluctantly fishing around in his pocket, he placed the device into Nora's palm, perhaps with a little more force than was necessary. Once he had done so, Pam quickly followed suit and they both watched as Nora crushed the pieces of junk in her hand and chucked the remains into the trees beside the road.

"Okay," she said brightly, brushing off her hands. "If you'll come with me, there's a harbor not too far from here where you'll be hitching a ride with SGS Petroleum to Canada," she announced, already turning to lead them to the docks.

"You're making us take a boat from Louisiana to Nova Scotia?" Pam asked disbelievingly to Nora's retreating back, her feet rooted to the spot.

"Think of it as a cruise," Nora called back. Looking over her shoulder at them with a mischievous twinkle in her eye, she added, "Only with no crude people and lots of crude oil."

Pam huffed furiously, but Eric just rolled his eyes and followed his sister. He wasn't going to lie; the idea of taking a boat full of crap up the Atlantic Coast hardly sounded appealing to him either. But it beat the alternative of waiting around here for the Authority to stake him, so he'll suck it up. Before long, he heard the click of Pam's heels on the road telling him that she too had gotten over it and was coming along for the (very long) ride to Canada.

Knowing that Pam could live without him for an hour (they were, after all, to be spending the next few centuries together in hiding), Eric instead caught up with Nora, quickly falling in step beside her. They were quiet for a minute as they walked, Eric simply appreciating the familiarity of her company having not been able to 'enjoy' it in decades.

"So I see you've finally gotten yourself a decent hair cut. Only took you a millennia," she teased, breaking the silence between them.

He gave a short laugh.

"Funny story, actually. Involves an amazingly stupid redneck, a lot of blood and Pamela's very modern and adventurous sense of style." He turned to look at her. "You'd have loved it."

She met his gaze with a grin.

"I'm sorry I missed it," she replied, the genuine quality to her voice catching him off guard.

As Eric studied her, he realized she wasn't just talking about his haircut. They held each other's gaze for a few seconds, neither of them saying a word but both of them thinking the same thing. It didn't take long for Nora to switch back to her more playful self, however, snapping them out of their brief moment as quickly as they'd gotten into it.

"Same can't be said for the old hair, though," she added, turning away with a renewed smile.

Despite the dig, Eric couldn't help but grin at her too. It had been over a century since they'd last said a word to each other, and it was an odd comfort to be able to pick things up right where he'd left off with Nora.

He was proud of his sister for how far she'd gone in her career. As Chancellor, she was one of the most powerful beings – human, vampire, were or witch – on the planet, only one step short of her ultimate goal of Guardian. It was an amazing feat, especially for someone so young.

But he also regretted the restrictions her job placed on their relationship, particularly in the days that had followed Godric's death. His maker's passing had been excruciatingly hard on him, and he knew it must have been hard on her too. Maybe it was stupid of him to have felt this way – he didn't know not having dealt with grief for nearly a millennia before the events at Dallas – but Eric would have risked almost anything to have had even just a few words with Nora then. Anything, that was, short of her life, which ironically enough was exactly what he would have risked by contacting her. So they'd both been forced to get through their shared tragedy alone.

Though, he reminded himself, he hadn't been completely alone. Not the first night at least, for to his surprise, Nora had not been the only person in the world with whom Eric could have shared his pain. There had been one other girl, and that night on the rooftop had been a turning point in his relationship with her. When she'd reached for his hand and told him she would stay with his maker until the very end, Eric had realized for the first time since meeting her that his fascination with Sookie Stackhouse went beyond a temporary curiosity and blood-lust. That had been the moment everything between them had changed, for that had been the moment he'd begun to accept that he'd actually developed feelings for Sookie Stackhouse.

In his bitter state, there was a part of him that wished Nora had been the one to get him through that night, not Sookie. It would have saved him a hell of a lot of trouble.

But she hadn't. And now here they were, finally having a few minutes together to reconnect before being separated again. If they were emotionally-functional humans, they'd probably be talking about their deceased maker right now. But they were neither emotionally-function nor, thank every god in the sky, human, so the subject didn't come up. And for that, Eric was grateful. He didn't see the point in revisiting past pain.

"Oh, I almost forgot. Your new identity," Nora said suddenly, a strange glint in her eye.

As she whipped out the papers and handed them to him, Eric gave her a curious look, trying to figure out what she was up to. It didn't take him long to work it out, however.

"Ike Applebaum?" he said, catching the name on the forms.

He raised an eyebrow at her, unimpressed and already dreading the prospect of introducing himself as fucking Ike Applebaum for the next few centuries. How the hell she expected him to say the name with a straight face, Eric did not know.

"I think it really suits you," she said proudly, biting back a laugh.

Eric glared at her. He could think of a few names that would really suit her too.

"Brat," he muttered under his breath, returning the favor and choosing one of the milder ones. But that only made her smile up at him even more broadly.

"Oh, lighten up. I could have made it much worse," she said, nudging him with her elbow as he folded the papers into his pocket.

Eric glanced down at her in equal parts annoyance and amusement.

"Over a century and a half apart, and 'Ike Applebaum' is all you're giving me?" he said in mock displeasure.

"Well if you want to fuck, all you have to do is ask," she said with a smug smile and a shrug.

"Classy," he drawled, coming to a halt at the edge of the dock, having reached their destination, and turning to face Nora.

"It's okay to admit you missed me. I've been told I'm a very difficult woman to get over," she said playfully, also stopping.

Eric scoffed. That was his sister for you. A body so tiny she could hardly reach his shoulder, but a head so big, it made up for whatever she lacked in height.

One second, they were staring at one another, each of them sizing the other up, and the next, Nora's hand was gripping the back of his head, pulling him down for a kiss. He'd recognized the determined look in Nora's eyes before she'd kissed him and knew perfectly well what she was doing. She was trying to prove a point and the stubborn side of him was tempted to act like a brother and refuse to give her what she wanted. But then there was the other part of him that, after everything, was prepared to welcome just about any distraction the world would offer from the heavy feeling settling in his gut.

So Eric gave in, responding to the kiss. And no sooner had he done so that Nora pulled away. Predictable, yet no less frustrating.

She smiled triumphantly up at him. "I missed you too," she breathed, taking his kiss as an admission.

Fuck it. Eric would let her win this one if it meant she'd take him as a prize. Impatiently, he threaded his fingers through her hair and brought her lips back to his, kissing her hungrily.

A minute later and he had her pressed against him in only her underwear, his own jacket and shirt discarded somewhere on the floor of the shipping container they'd locked themselves in. Their every move was rough, hurried and desperate. He didn't know how long they had before the boat arrived, but in that moment there was nothing Eric wanted more than to fuck them both into oblivion.

He wanted to forget.

Nora's tiny hand fisted his hair in an effort to pull him impossibly closer.

Forget Fangtasia.

Eric hastily ripped off her bra and threw it to the floor, his lips glued to hers.

Forget Louisiana.

Nora's fingers frantically fumbled with the zipper on his jeans until she finally pulled it down, his pants following soon after.

And forget Sookie Stackhouse.

Eric slammed Nora's bare back against the wall, his mouth devouring every inch of her neck he could reach. He felt her legs wrap tightly around his waist, pushing him against her panty-covered core.

"Fuck, Eric," she panted into his ear before he drew a moan from her lips.

And fuck if right now, he was pretty damn close to accomplishing all of that. That was, until…

"Oh, sorry," came the very unwelcome and unapologetic voice of his progeny from the now-open door.

Standing frozen with his mouth still stuck to Nora's jaw and his fingers curved under the edge of her panties, Eric suppressed the urge to curse out his progeny and his luck. To put it bluntly, her timing fucking sucked.

Pulling his lips away from Nora's skin and pushing his forehead against her cheek, Eric spoke, fighting to keep his voice calm, "_What_, Pam?"

He could feel Nora's chest heaving against his as she too tried to collect herself.

"I just thought you might like to know, our ride is here," Pam explained with a smirk before turning to leave, taking obvious pleasure in denying the two of them theirs. Of course, because she was going to be stuck, miserable, on a boat for a week, she had to make sure the people who put her there would be miserable too.

For a second, neither of them moved. In all honesty, Eric was considering just ditching the damn boat and getting back to screwing his sister, but Nora had already begun to disentangle herself from him, taking that option away. So reluctantly, Eric took a step back, releasing his hold on Nora and retrieving his clothes in frustrated silence.

A few seconds later, they were both dressed and outside. Moving swiftly and quietly, they sped toward the back of the ship so as to avoid being seen by the two humans loading the cargo on the other end. Stopping at the base of the boat, Eric faced Nora one final time before boarding.

He didn't know when, if ever, they'd be seeing each other again and the wistful look in Nora's eyes told him she was thinking the same. Standing on tiptoe, she pressed her lips to his in another kiss, this one soft and tender to contrast the frenzied, ravenous ones they'd shared earlier.

"Be safe," she whispered, pulling away.

Their eyes met and Eric was immediately reminded of the innocent, stubborn and courageous girl he'd helped rescue from the plague. Nora had changed a great deal since her human days, letting the world shape her into the lethal predator and political mastermind she was today. But one thing that she'd never grown out of was her unbounded devotion to those she most cared about. She was risking everything tonight on his behalf (Pam's as well), and that was not something he would soon forget.

"Thank you," he said in return, hoping the sincerity in his voice matched that which he felt. The crew had finished loading the crates and was preparing to leave; there wasn't time for him to elaborate on everything he was thanking her for. But she got the message all the same.

With a small smile, Nora took a step back, her eyes glued to him. Nodding goodbye, Eric stole one last look at his sister before turning away and taking off to join Pam onboard.

Apparently tonight was a night full of lasts and goodbyes, though maybe that wasn't as bad a thing as he'd originally thought. He'd been in Louisiana far longer than he'd ever intended thanks to his appointment as sheriff and the opening of Fangtasia. But now that he'd undoubtedly lost the position, the business and the girl, there was nothing left for him here. And he was done focusing on the negatives. Doing so wasn't going to change his situation. Eric was ready to move on from this chapter of his life, and in a twisted way, this mess with the Authority had just made all of that possible. It was high time he embraced it.

* * *

**SPOV**

_'It's Russell Edgington, Sook. He's on the loose.'_

Sookie was furious. What the ever-loving fuck were Bill and Eric thinking, leaving Russell alive? The guy was dangerous enough as a 3,000 year-old vampire, but a 3,000 year-old vampire who was hell-bent on killing them all? That was a walking death wish.

"This is Eric Northman. I am currently unable to answer the phone. However if you so desire, you may leave me a message and I will get back to you shortly."

"Eric, this is the ninth time I've called you in the last hour. I know you're mad at me and probably don't want to so much as look at me right now, but I swear to God this is a matter of life and death. And not just my life, yours as well. So… please just pick up the damn phone already and let me know you're okay so I can explain what's going on."

With that, she ended the call, making a sharp turn that was sure to leave skid-marks on the road.

Clearly, the universe hadn't gotten the memo that Sookie Stackhouse had resigned from dealing with all things supernatural. But even so, would it have killed the world to give her just one day off between supernatural crises? She hadn't had twelve hours to get over Marnie, Debbie and Tara before Alcide had shown up at her front door, giving her his condolences about Tara and warning her about Russell's return, all the while unaware that he was entering the house in which his ex-fiancée had been killed the night before. By her.

_'Russell's gonna come after you which is why you've gotta stay with me,' Alcide warned, earnestly grabbing her hand where it rested on the kitchen table, his eyes practically begging her to agree. _

_But she couldn't go with him, and the more she thought about why, the closer she came to breaking down all over again and confessing the truth to Alcide._

_'I can't,' she said in a small voice, refusing to look him in the eye._

_'Sookie…' he pleaded._

_'What about Bill and Eric?' Sookie asked, quickly changing the subject before Alcide pushed her any further._

_She felt his hand stiffen over hers at the question._

_'What about them?' he grunted in an accusatory tone._

_Sookie gave him a look. She liked Alcide and all, but the minute vampires entered the picture, he almost always started behaving like a scorned five-year-old on a playground._

_'Have you told them? About Russell?' she prodded._

_Even for Alcide, the annoyance on his face was honestly a bit alarming. What, was she supposed to not care about the lives of her friends too? Well, not exactly friends, but still. Point was, even though she'd cut ties with them, she didn't want them to die and while she'd committed a multitude of crimes recently, worrying about Eric and Bill's lives had not been one of them. So she would appreciate it if Alcide stopped acting like it was._

_'Seriously? They're the reason he's out in the first place. If they'd just killed him when they had the chance, none of this would've happened,' Alcide raged, growing angrier by the second._

_Sookie wouldn't be surprised if he started barking – literally barking – at her soon. Men..._

_'Alcide…' she began testily._

_They stared at one another, both angry and both stubborn. But in the end, one of them was going to hold out longer, and this time that someone was her._

_He sighed before resignedly answering, 'I tried, but Northman wasn't answering his phone and Fangtasia was closed when I swung over.'_

_'And Bill?' she asked, already knowing the answer._

_Alcide leaned back in his chair._

_'I dunno, I don't have the guy's number and his house is surrounded by guards 24/7. No way I was risking a bullet in the head for that,' he grumbled in response._

_'So they don't know,' Sookie concluded, already rising from her seat. _

_Alcide said nothing._

_'I've gotta warn them,' she stated, moving away from the table and heading toward the door._

_'No, Sookie.' Alcide grabbed her hand. 'Let me handle that. You have to worry about yourself,' he insisted, the worry in his eyes making Sookie feel even guiltier about the secret she was keeping from him. She doubted he'd be this adamant she stay safe if he knew the truth. 'I can guarantee that you and Eric are at the top of that guy's hitlist –'_

_'Which is exactly why I've got to get a hold of Eric before Russell does.'_

Which, as it turned out, was much easier said than done. Sookie didn't know if he was deliberately ignoring her, if his phone was dead, if his day-time slumber was too deep to be interrupted by a continually-ringing phone or if something terrible had happened to him, but she wasn't going to rest until she knew Eric was aware of the situation and was taking the proper precautions to stay safe.

All the same, she couldn't help the fear she felt rising in her like water in a bucket every time she thought about Eric. Sookie had been trying frantically to reach both Eric and Bill all afternoon and was currently on her way to Fangtasia in the hopes that, despite what Alcide had said, Eric would be there. She'd already tried reaching Bill, seeing as how he lived right across the cemetery, but he hadn't been home and Jessica had no idea where he could be. Nor was he answering his cell, something he and Eric apparently had in common. Their silence didn't bode well for either of them and the logical part of Sookie knew that if Bill and Eric had both vanished on the same night Russell had risen… well it was highly unlikely that was a coincidence.

'No,' she told herself firmly. She wasn't going to even think that. Eric and Bill were fine. They were probably just off dealing with some stupid vampire political issue, seeing as how they were sheriff and king respectively. Yes, that had to be it. She wasn't about to let herself believe that Russell had already gotten to them and…

Sookie slammed hard on the brake just before she could run the red light. Breathing heavily, she tried in vain to remain calm as the other cars sped through the intersection. That had been the second time in twenty-four hours that she'd almost died, and with that realization, the fact that she'd been within an inch of death last night suddenly hit her like a tidal wave. Up till now, she'd been too preoccupied feeling guilty about Tara, scared about Debbie and worried about Russell to really think about her near-death experience with the deceased were. But now that she was, the wonder she felt at being alive only added to the bizarre mix of emotions she'd been dealing with today.

People had been blowing up her phone all morning since the news of Tara's death had reached the ears of Bon Temps' citizens. Some were calling to see how she was holding up, others calling to try to get information out of her about the homicide, and others (Sookie suspected) just trying to stir up trouble so they'd have something to gossip to their friends about later. All the talk about Tara had made it impossible for Sookie to move past her grief and guilt, even for a minute, since last night.

If it hadn't been for Tara's sacrifice, Sookie would be nothing but a cold body in the morgue right now, and never had she ever been more aware of her own continued existence than at that very moment.

Beginning to feel uncomfortable, Sookie reached for her phone again, snatching it up off the passenger seat and redialing Eric's number. Unsurprisingly, it went straight to voice-mail but this time, Sookie snapped.

"Fine, if you won't answer your phone, then at least listen to my message. Russell Edgington is on the loose, and it's probably safe to bet he's looking to kill all of us. Which reminds me, you've got a lot of explaining to do about why the hell you didn't kill him when you had the chance and why you couldn't even tell me you left him alive. Did you seriously think a slab of concrete would be enough to protect the world from that maniac?" Sookie spat angrily.

"Anyway, since you're refusing to act like a grown-up and pick up the phone, I'm on my way over to Fangtasia and I'm not leaving until you grow a pair and fucking talk to me," she hissed, pulling the phone away from her ear at the last sentence and throwing it back on the seat just as the light turned green.

Quickly hitting the gas pedal, Sookie continued to drive well over the speed-limit through Shreveport, only a minute away now from her final destination. She'd made the trip to Fangtasia so many times recently, she was beginning to think she could get there with her eyes closed.

Pulling up to the bar a few minutes later, Sookie hurried out of the car and began pounding on the front door, praying to God that somebody would answer. Nobody did, but as she continued to knock and yell, she was soon able to pick up on a brain pattern from inside. It was human, and after a little digging, Sookie figured out who it was.

"Ginger? Ginger, it's me, Sookie. Can you open the door, please?" she asked, putting her assault on Fangtasia's door on pause so she could talk to Ginger without scaring her. Seriously though, didn't that poor girl ever go home? "I need to speak with Eric, it's an emergency."

Sookie waited, her ear and palms pressed to the cool black surface of the door. She couldn't hear anything going on inside, but she could hear Ginger's thoughts and while Ginger's mind wasn't exactly the most coherent she'd ever listened in on, she was able to put together enough to know that Ginger, while wary, was preparing to speak with her.

Quickly scrambling back a few steps, Sookie watched the door creak open just wide enough for Ginger to peek out.

"Sookie? What're you doin' here?" she asked suspiciously.

Sookie closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Really, she'd _just_ answered that and she didn't have time to repeat herself. But she needed to stay on Ginger's good-side if she wanted to get any information from her, so she put on her 'sweet-Sookie' face and answered as politely as she could manage. That said, it was taking everything Sookie had not to let her impatience with Ginger show.

"I told you," she began slowly. "I need to speak with Eric."

"Well, he ain't here," Ginger said matter-of-factly, straightening as she spoke. "So you're gonna have to leave and come back tonight after we open."

She moved to close the door, but Sookie hastily stopped her.

"No, wait!" Sookie slammed her hand against the door before it could shut completely. "Do you know where he is?" she asked desperately, already knowing what Ginger's answer would be.

Eric would never have shared his resting place with a human, least of all one as unreliable and easily-glamoured as Ginger. But she had to ask.

"No, I don't," came Ginger's expected answer. "And you can't be here during the day neither," she added, a shifty look in her eyes.

She was hiding something behind that door, Sookie knew it from the way Ginger was refusing to let her see past it. Her eyebrows furrowed slightly as she tried to figure out what it was before deciding on the spot to peer into Ginger's mind again to learn just what Ginger was keeping from her. If it could help her track down Eric…

Not even waiting a second after delving into Ginger's mind, Sookie firmly pushed open the door, taking advantage of a shocked Ginger to march straight past her as well. For a long minute, Sookie simply stood in the middle of the room, examining in uneasy silence the overturned chairs, skewed tables and broken glass strewn across the floor.

"Ginger, what happened?" Sookie demanded, spinning on her heels to face the waitress, refusing to believe the worst until she had undeniable proof that Russell Edgington had been the one to raid this bar.

"I-I don't know," Ginger stuttered, petrified at the sudden shift in Sookie's demeanor. But heartless as it may sound, Sookie had bigger things to worry about than a frightened Ginger, so she did nothing to calm her down. "I came in t'work today, and the place was a mess. No blood, no note, no nothin'. I was just about to start straightening the place back up again when you came knockin'," she shakily explained.

Her apprehension building, Sookie whipped around again, turning her back to Ginger.

No blood. That was good. If she had learned one thing from all her time with vampires, it was that when they died, vampires left one hell of a mess behind them. So no blood meant that even if Russell had been here, he hadn't killed Eric. At least not immediately.

Taking deep breaths, Sookie tried to reason with herself. Despite the trashed bar, empty home and radio silence from both Eric and Bill, there was still no proof that Russell was the cause of any of this and no proof that either of them were dead. She couldn't let herself believe otherwise. She needed to keep her head straight so she could formulate a plan because she refused to accept the very likely possibility that Eric and Bill were both dead, even for a second.


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Wow, I suck. ****I'm so sorry, I hate keeping you guys waiting so long between updates! I know how frustrating that can be. I hope you're all still interested and aren't _too_ mad at me for leaving you hanging this long... You've all heard it before, but I was busy and didn't have the time I'd hoped I'd have in December/January to write Chapter 5. And I'm going to be honest, I was having a hard time deciding how I wanted to structure this chapter as well. I was starting to worry that it was moving too slowly and I was ****particularly unsure over how I felt about the POV I used in the middle passage. But, I got over it and finally have Chapter 5 up and ready for you guys :) So let me know what you think! I love getting feedback from you all. It really does do wonders in motivating me to write, and I only wish I could give back more often with faster updates..**

**Anyways, enjoy the next chapter! I don't own anything, and all mistakes are my own.**

* * *

**SPOV**

Sookie sat at the bar, her sixth glass of water carelessly rolling against her fingers as she waited for Eric's increasingly unlikely return to Fangtasia. Staying at Fangtasia today had really served a dual-purpose. For one, it had provided her with a much-needed escape from her home. Sookie couldn't stand the idea of sitting idly in her kitchen with the phone ringing off the hook and the memory of Debbie and Tara etched in her brain another minute, and the way she saw it, there wasn't anything she would've done at home that she couldn't do here. Secondly, she'd decided this afternoon that before she took any dramatic action, she needed to be sure that Eric was truly missing and not just ignoring her. So she'd spent the rest of her day and evening here in Fangtasia, helping Ginger tidy up and hoping against hope that Eric – or even Pam – would walk through that front door at any minute.

For on top of losing Eric and Bill, Sookie was now unable to reach Pam as well. And without Eric or Pam around to run Fangtasia, Chow had taken it upon himself to oversee the bar's night-to-night routine. Upon his arrival, Sookie had questioned Chow about Eric, Bill and Pam's whereabouts in a last ditch attempt to track them down, but he, like everyone else, had no idea where any of them could be.

As far as she could tell, Chow wasn't even remotely concerned about his colleagues' absence. According to him, this was hardly the first time they'd left the bar to him for a night and he didn't see any reason to be alarmed. Of course, he didn't know the full story. Sookie was hesitant to say anything to him about Russell lest she cause a panic within the vampire community and some sort of vampire authority killed her off for it. So yeah, she supposed that as far as he knew, there was no need to worry. Sookie, however, knew quite the opposite to be true.

Russell was out there, and whether he was speaking to her or not, Eric needed to know about it. But the longer Sookie sat there, the more apparent it became that this was proving to be a complete waste of time. If she were being honest with herself, she'd known from the moment she saw the state of Fangtasia in Ginger's mind that Eric was not going to be coming in tonight. She'd just been hoping she was wrong.

She needed to think up a new plan, one that involved her actually _doing_ something. But first, she really needed to pee.

Standing from her seat with the intention of quickly using the restroom, Sookie was stopped in her tracks by the sight of a single, dark-skinned male vampire striding purposefully into the club with five armed vampires fanned out behind him. Sookie's eyes narrowed at the six of them, her common sense telling her that the vampire in front was someone important and her gut adding that his reasons for being here were not good ones. In fact, she had a sneaking suspicion that those reasons were somehow linked to Eric's ominous disappearance. This was just one too many big events to happen in the vampire world of Shreveport for them all not to be connected.

She wasn't the only one staring at the group that had entered either. A hush had fallen over the entire club as everyone – vampire and human – watched the six approach the bar. The only noise now came from the music that continued to blare through the club's high-end speakers.

The newcomers, on the other hand, paid absolutely no attention to Sookie or any of the other customers. They had eyes only for Chow, as evidenced by the uncaring manner with which they pushed her aside to speak with him from where he stood behind the bar. Chow, for his part, was trying to look bored as he eyed the group and set aside the glass he'd been polishing.

Leaning forward, his hands gripping the edge of the bar table, Chow asked them a simple, "Yes?"

That was vampires for you. No preamble, pretenses or pleasantries, just straight and to the point.

"I wish to speak with whoever is in charge of this establishment," the dark vampire commanded in a dangerously soft and velvety voice, his eyes meeting Chow's and not once wavering.

There was a tense second in which Chow carefully studied the vampire before him and nobody in the club so much as breathed. Even the most lust-ridden of fangbangers could sense the seriousness and precarious nature of this exchange.

"Mr. Northman and Ms. de Beaufort are currently unavailable. However, I would be more than happy to relay whatever message you have to the both of them," Chow finally responded in a level tone, matching the other vampire in his careful cordiality.

The vampire gave Chow a humorless smile. Far from looking pleasant, Sookie thought it made him look like her old cat, Tina, when she was about to pounce on the small, unfortunate rodent that had unwittingly crossed her path. The analogy sent a chill down Sookie's spine.

"Perfect," he said, taking a second to glance around the rest of the room for the first time since arriving. "Is there someplace we can speak in private?"

In answer, Chow moved from the bar, clearly intending for the group to follow him to Eric's office. Not once did he so much as look at Sookie as he walked away and the six vampires, as predicted, ignored her as they left the bar. Instead, she was left to stare at the now-closed office door, frustrated at being left in the dark and apprehensive beyond belief at the news the vampires could have brought with them. She was simultaneously upset and relieved that there were no humans inside the office for her to listen in on because as much as she wanted to know what was going on behind that door, she was also scared to hear the answer.

As the minutes passed with nobody emerging from Eric's office, the tension slowly seeped out of the room and everyone in the bar gradually resumed their drinking, dancing and relentless flirting. Apparently, the whole "out of sight, out of mind" thing had some merit to it. Unfortunately, the opposite seemed to be the case when it came to her.

Something about the way the vampire had asked to speak with "the ones in charge" didn't sit right with Sookie. It was almost as if the request had been a test, though a test for what Sookie couldn't be sure. A test to see how much Chow knew?

Any number of things could be going on mere feet away from her, things that she was almost certain had to do with Eric, and the more she thought about what those things could be, the tighter the knot in her stomach became. Who was the vampire? What did he want with Chow? Was he just here to talk or did he have more menacing motives behind his visit?

And then, another thought crossed Sookie's mind, one that made her blood instantly run cold. If these vampires were connected to Eric's disappearance, there was a good chance they were also connected to Russell. What if they were here for her? She hadn't been able to see the faces of the five men standing guard; any one of them could be Russell Edgington himself.

Sookie immediately regretted not filling Chow in on Russell's return. What if Russell was, at that very moment, killing Chow before going after her?

Drumming her fingers on the bar top, her bladder long since forgotten, Sookie reached a decision. There was a gun behind the bar; she remembered using it to scare Ginger into taking her to Lafayette when he'd been locked in Fangtasia's basement. If she could find it, she'd have a weapon (though admittedly, it'd be pretty useless in a room full of vamps) and if she had a weapon, she'd no longer feel completely defenseless and idiotic when she knocked on Eric's office door to see what was going on inside.

Before she could reach for the gun, however, Eric's office door swung open to reveal the five guards and their employer walking briskly out of the office and straight for the exit. Silence fell over the crowded club so quickly, it was almost comical. The mere presence of the six vampires commanded the attention of everyone in the room, the absence of the seventh being even more conspicuous than his actual presence would have been.

But to Sookie's relief, Chow too emerged from the office a second later, a distracted look on his usually intimidatingly emotionless face as he followed the six to the door, practically shepherding them out of Fangtasia. The moment they left, Chow closed the door behind them and Sookie rushed up to him, hiding her shaking fingers in her pockets as she asked, "Who was that? Does he know what happened to Eric?"

Chow, however, barely spared her a glance.

"Eric and Pam are gone. Fangtasia is now owned and run by the Louisiana regency," he explained curtly, already moving past her to resume his post behind the bar.

Sookie stared at him blankly. 'Gone'? Did that mean 'gone from Louisiana' or 'gone from this Earth'? And why was Fangtasia being taken over by the vampire government? While the logical answer to both of these questions left her feeling nothing but dread, nobody was giving her a straight answer.

And Louisiana regency? Did that still mean Bill or did he now fall under that blanket 'gone' too?

Sookie could feel her heart beating rapidly in her chest and the pressure building in her head as she watched Chow walk away, all too aware of the fact that the two of them currently held the attention of the entire nightclub.

That, however, was put to a forceful end as Chow glowered at each customer in turn until they got to message: get back to what you were doing or get the hell out.

Finally snapping back to it, Sookie nimbly pushed her way through the crowd to resume her conversation with Chow.

"What do you mean 'Eric is gone'?" she asked him, her fingers clutched around the edge of the bar table as she leaned forward. "Do you know where he is? Or what happened to him? And why is Fangtasia –"

But Chow, who had suddenly vamped around the bar to stand mere inches from her face, cut her off. His fangs were extended and there was a dangerous look in his eyes that made Sookie take an instinctive step back. The people closest to them turned to stare at the scene, forcing Chow to lower his voice to a hiss only she could hear.

"Listen, Sookie. I know you're used to getting whatever information you want about vampires out of Eric and King Bill with just a flick of your hair and a flash of that charming, Southern Belle smile. But most of us? We prefer for humans to know as little about our kind as possible. And that includes you. Now if you want a drink, then by all means stay but if not, then I suggest you head home."

Taken aback by the underlying threat, Sookie glared furiously up at Chow, regaining some of her nerve in the process.

"I am not some mindless redneck Eric and Bill like to humor and dote upon, and I refuse to be treated like one," she said in a heated whisper before she could stop herself.

Okay, talking back to a pissed off vampire may not be her brightest move, but she knew Chow well enough to know he wouldn't hurt her for it. Not in front of all these witnesses, at least.

Taking back the step she'd lost, she continued, "In case you haven't noticed, I'm trying to help find them, which I _thought _was what you wanted too. I'm not oblivious, I know something's not right here, so forgive me for doing everything I can to get the answers I need to help me track them down."

She paused for a second before adding, "And don't you dare make the mistake of talking to or about me like that again. You're not the only one here who possesses supernatural gifts and power."

If talking back to a pissed off vampire had been a bad idea then threatening one was just plain stupid. But she was still on edge from everything that had happened, and when she was on edge, she had a tendency to be impulsive as well.

"Get out," he growled, leaving no question that she had outstayed her welcome.

Sookie swallowed nervously but aside from that, refused to let her fear show.

"Tell me what's going on," she said firmly, holding her ground.

She doubted it was going to get her anywhere, though. Bullying a vampire was hardly the right way to go about getting information out of them and Sookie was already beginning to regret her earlier outburst. Clearly, a strategist she was not.

"Go!"

Sookie was proud of herself for not flinching away from Chow, but that sense of pride didn't stick around for long. Chow was deadly serious when he commanded her to leave, and dying at Chow's hands was not on her to-do list for today. So as frustrating as it was to come this close to answers only to be turned away, she knew it would do her no good to argue. She'd just have to find another way to get the information she needed.

Holding her head up high, Sookie swiftly grabbed her stuff from the tabletop beside her and hurried for the door. Just as she was walking through it, however, her eyes landed on Ginger, who was reentering the club after doing Lord-only-knew-what outside. Struck by an idea, Sookie hastened to pull Ginger aside.

"Oh hey, Sookie! You leaving already?" Ginger said brightly.

"Yeah, I think it's time I head out," Sookie answered with a quick glance over her shoulder at Chow. He may be at the other end of the room, but Sookie had a nasty feeling he was listening in on their conversation.

Lowering her voice in an attempt to hide it under the noise of the club, she gave Ginger one of her 'Sookie-smiles' before continuing, "Listen Ginger, do you think you could keep an eye out for anything… out of the ordinary going on around here? I don't know when I'll be able to come back, but I'm worried about Eric."

"Sure, though I have to say, pretty much everything that goes on 'round here is 'out of the ordinary'. Never a dull moment," Ginger said with a smile that Sookie tightly returned.

"Well, anything out of the ordinary, even for here. Especially if you think it has to do with Eric. If you see or hear anything from him…"

She was trying to sound casual so as not to alarm Ginger and attract Chow's attention, but as it turned out, alarm wasn't the reaction she should have anticipated from Ginger. Rather, the waitress shifted uneasily in her spot, her face contorting into an expression of… was that pity?

"Yeah, of course. If I see him I'll let ya know," she began slowly.

But there was something else on Ginger's mind, something Sookie could tell she both wanted and was hesitant to say aloud. She could hear what it was in Ginger's head clear as day though, and she responded to it without thinking.

"He's alive and he's coming back," Sookie said, sounding more confident in her words than she actually felt.

Ginger, who was always startled whenever Sookie used her gift around her, took a few steps back. However, she quickly shook it off and regained her composure (much quicker than Sookie had expected, if she were being honest). Maybe after all this time in the company of supes, Ginger was finally getting used to dealing with the strange and unexplainable.

"Well, I sure hope you're right," she said sincerely. "Cause a world without Eric Northman's fine, rock-hard, Viking ass in it is not one I want to be living in," she added, her eyes going distant and a wistful smile crossing her face somewhere around the word 'Eric'.

Now it was Sookie's turn to feel uncomfortable. Trying to banish all thoughts of Eric's derriere from her head, Sookie cleared her throat in an attempt to direct the conversation back to the task at hand.

"Right. Well, like I said. If you see him or anything that you think might help me track him down, could you let me know?" she repeated.

Ginger blinked a few times at Sookie, coming back to Earth.

"Sure thing, hon," she said, still not sounding entirely convinced anyone would be hearing anything from Eric Northman, but putting her normal, non-lust-filled smile back on her face nonetheless.

But Sookie didn't need Ginger to believe her. She just needed her to be willing to help.

"Thanks again, Ginger," she said hastily, her eyes flicking back to Chow.

And with that, she moved past Ginger to leave for real before he came over and threw her out himself.

She didn't know what to make of Chow's sudden shift in attitude towards her. Admittedly, the two of them had never exactly been close. In fact come to think of it, she hadn't seen him once since Maryann. And maybe threatening the guy wasn't the best way to go about making friends. But as far as she could remember, he'd always been reasonably cordial to her. Just this evening, he'd been relatively open when discussing Eric and Pam, even allowing her to hang around Fangtasia for hours ordering nothing but water without comment.

She remembered the look on Chow's face when he'd left Eric's office a few minutes earlier. What had that vampire said to Chow that could bother him so much it visibly showed?

"You take care now!" Sookie vaguely heard Ginger call to her over the noise of the crowd outside, sounding mildly concerned for Sookie.

_'I'm not the one you should be worried about,'_ she thought in return as she climbed into her yellow Civic.

* * *

**Nan's POV**

"What the hell do you mean, 'he's dead'? Who the fuck killed him?" Nan spat into the burner phone she'd glamoured some human into buying her an hour ago.

She couldn't fucking believe this. Of course, after she and Bill found his bar raided and empty last night, Nan figured the former-sheriff had met the true death by the Authority's hands. But now it was confirmed, and Eric Northman dead was quite frankly really inconvenient.

_'I should've known that even when all I needed from them was to fucking stay alive, Fuck Up One and Fuck Up Two would find some way to screw me over,'_ she thought, glancing at Fuck Up One himself as he leaned against one of the alley's damp walls, pretending not to listen to her conversation. Nan rolled her eyes as she turned away from him. Really, how naïve did he think she was? She knew who Bill Compton was, perhaps better than Bill did himself.

"Chancellor Gainesborough. After you disappeared with Mr. Compton, she was ordered to bring him and his progeny back to New Orleans for questioning. They tried to escape, leaving Nora with no choice but to stake the both of them," Salome answered smoothly.

Now that made Nan pause, her eyes narrowing at Salome's story. Nora Gainesborough killed Eric Northman? Yeah, she might believe it if she didn't also know that Eric Northman was Chancellor Gainesborough's brother. A little tidbit of information she'd picked up a few centuries ago, one that was now proving to be very useful to have.

While Nora's actions to protect Northman in the past were always subtle, if you knew what you were looking for, as Nan did, it wasn't hard to see that family meant everything to Nora Gainesborough. So the Brit wasn't about to kill her own brother over something as trivial as an order from Roman Zimojic. Someone was hiding something, and whether that someone was Nora or Salome made absolutely no difference to Nan. It was the some_thing_ that was of interest to her.

"Is there a problem, Miss. Flanagan?" Salome asked.

The question itself was innocent, but Nan was no idiot. She could hear the challenge in Salome's words.

"Having to deal with one less imbecile – two if you include his progeny – is hardly a problem," she dismissed, trying to diffuse the situation before it could really become a situation.

And had this happened two weeks ago, she would have meant it. But on the contrary, what she needed tonight was Eric Northman alive and at her side. Instead, he was most likely alive, but untraceable, which didn't help her one goddamn bit.

Going into this, Nan knew that what she required most was the aid of a powerful vampire she could trust, or more accurately a powerful vampire who trusted her more than they trusted the Authority. And up till now, Nan had believed Eric Northman to be the perfect candidate for the job. Eric was one of, if not the oldest, vampires left in the States and she remembered the nature of Northman's dealings with the Authority last year; his relationship with them had soured considerably after they'd refused to help him track down Russell Edgington. Add to that the distrust he'd already been harboring against the Authority simply for the amount of power they held over him, and Nan had figured that informing him of his own death sentence would be the proverbial straw that broke Eric Northman's back. He'd turn on the Authority and everyone in it (save his sister, but Nan had already been working on a way around that) and he'd turn with her and Bill Compton. For despite being an arrogant, irritatingly smug excuse for a vampire, Eric Northman was a cunning survivor.

But the only thing Northman was now was AWOL, leaving her without her powerful ally and in the one position she hated being in above all others: behind. While she'd thought she'd be a step ahead of her opponents at this point, without the Viking, she was now quite the opposite. She was now without a plan. Which was perhaps the only situation that could make her feel genuine fear and panic. Especially when she considered who she was up against.

"Well I must admit, I do find it rather curious that you decided to save Mr. Compton when you had the chance to kill him. I was under the impression that since his appointment as king, you came to see him as being even more incompetent than the Sheriff," Salome said conversationally.

Anyone with a brain could tell, however, that "curious" was just another word for "suspicious", and anyone with any semblance of a survival instinct would know Nan should choose her next words wisely.

"Oh believe me, he's the biggest mistake Lorena Krasiki ever made," Nan scoffed with a glance over her shoulder at Bill.

She smirked as the younger vampire made the smallest of twitches. Not listening, her ass.

"But even the greatest blunders have their uses," she added, going back to staring down the dark alley she was standing in rather than at her new and sole ally.

"Perhaps."

Salome sounded unconvinced, but the fact that she intended to let the subject drop was enough for Nan and definitely a sign in her favor. Unlike her situation with Northman.

Nan was almost certain the former Viking was still alive, but whether or not he could still be of use to her was a different story entirely. Should she allocate all of her efforts into tracking him down or should she start considering new alliances to replace his?

Nan may be proud, but she'd learned long ago that arrogance and ego only made you a bloody puddle on the floor. She wasn't naïve enough to believe she was the oldest, strongest or even most strategic vampire alive and she also knew that in order to take down the Authority Salome planned to build, she'd need someone who was pretty damn close to it on her side.

Putting her money on Northman would be a gamble. Even if she did manage to discover his whereabouts in a relatively short amount of time, there was no guarantee that he would agree to help her take down her – their – enemies. In short, Nan couldn't be sure that putting in the time and effort to find Northman would pay off. The possibility of wasting one night at his bar was one thing; the possibility of wasting weeks on a search was a whole other. And she didn't have weeks to waste.

But on the other hand, she didn't have many options left outside of Eric Northman to fill the post of "ancient, levelheaded, strategic and Authority-hating vampire" either.

Or did she?

"And our friend from Mississippi?" Nan inquired, masking her sudden interest impeccably with a getting-down-to-business tone.

"Everything is going as planned."

"I'm glad to hear it." And she meant it. She'd be downright giddy right about now if she still felt emotions the way humans did. For as the humans put it, she was back in the game. "I'll be in touch if anything of interest arises."

With one swift motion, Nan clicked the phone shut and destroyed it in her hand. The moment she did so, Bill moved away from the wall to stand before her.

"Well?" he asked expectantly, crossing his arms over his chest.

Nan looked him over, evaluating the vampire in front of her in an attempt to determine just how much she could trust him. Not much, she knew. But this new plan of hers was one she had a good feeling he'd be on board with. Once she got him past the pesky issue of Russell Edgington, of course.

"How badly do you want to see Eric Northman meet the true death?" she asked with a smirk.

"Eric is already dead," Bill responded immediately, raising a challenging eyebrow and dropping any and all pretenses that he hadn't heard her phone conversation. Well at least he wasn't a complete idiot.

He thought she was lying to him, trying to trick him into something, and she supposed he thought he was being clever by calling her out on it. But he'd acted rashly, letting his impatience and ego get the better of him - a mistake he hadn't yet outgrown as a mere century-old vampire. The smirk on Nan's face grew into a condescending laugh.

"Don't believe everything you hear, especially when you only know half the facts."

* * *

**SPOV**

The gravel crunched beneath the tires of the car as Sookie turned into her driveway and switched off the engine. Staring at the blank dashboard, her head lost in thought, she found herself hit by an unwelcome wave of déjà vu. All of this was feeling way too familiar, way too much like the events of last night: returning from Fangtasia, arriving home late at night (in fact, the time was almost the same to the minute), the house standing dark and quiet before her. Except this time, for the first time in her life, the sight of her family's yellow farmhouse made her feel cold and unwelcome, not safe and content like it usually did.

Her Gran's home had become the center of so much death and loss in the past year, and little by little, all of that darkness had chipped away at the welcoming atmosphere that once encompassed the house. It broke her heart to think of how drastically things had changed for the worse, and Sookie couldn't help but feel ashamed of herself for surrendering to it and allowing that darkness to taint her memory of what she considered to be her true childhood home. But too much had happened here for it not to have an affect on Sookie, and while it took everything she had to admit this to herself, she was actually dreading the prospect of reentering the yellow farmhouse.

For a crazy moment, she considered turning around and asking Jason to spend the night at his place instead. But, she reasoned with herself, even if she did, she couldn't stay there forever. She'd have to return to her own home eventually; might as well be tonight. So with a sigh, Sookie pushed away the uneasy feeling that had settled in the pit of her stomach and left the confines of the car. Having learned her lesson from the night before, she counted the brain patterns she could detect on the property before going inside and found none, indicating that Lafayette had gone home.

And sure enough, upon entering her kitchen, Sookie spotted a note on the table from him. The message was brief, almost impersonal, and Sookie figured his mind had still been on the double tragedy he'd been hit with the day before when he'd written it. Between their tense, late-night cleanup and Alcide's surprise visit that afternoon, the two of them hadn't yet had a chance to properly talk through yesterday's events. She wondered, not for the first time, if he blamed her for Tara's death and if that was the real reason he'd left her house as abruptly as he did.

Noticing the flashing light on her answering machine, Sookie dropped Lafayette's note on the table to skim through her messages instead. To her disappointment, not one of them was from Jess, Bill, Eric or Pam. Not that she expected Eric, Bill or Pam to contact her; she'd accepted by now that the three of them were truly missing and that if she wanted to talk to any of them, she'd have to find them herself. But she had hoped that Jessica might have found or heard something. The last time Bill went missing, he'd called Jessica through their maker-progeny bond to help her find him, and a part of Sookie had been crossing her fingers for a repeat. But the messages on her machine were all calls about Tara, and Sookie wound up deleting each one of them without fully listening.

Even if he was mad at her, Sookie selfishly wished Lafayette were still here. Not that she blamed him for wanting to leave the home in which his cousin was shot, but the last thing Sookie wanted was to be alone in this empty house either.

Her gaze wandered over the dimly-lit kitchen, landing almost automatically on the corner in which she'd found her Gran's body over a year ago. Flinching at the memory of the distinct stench of blood, she turned to the right, only for her eyes to find the spot on her fridge that just twenty-four hours ago had been splattered with the remnants of Debbie's head. Then there was the table at which she'd lied to Alcide's face about his deceased ex-fiancée this afternoon; the missing door on the cabinet she'd removed that morning because of the shattered glass the bullet had left behind after traveling through her best friend's skull; the doorway where Rene had stood when she'd seen Cindy Marshall's murder in his mind; the sink at which Eggs had frantically washed the blood from his hands – the blood that, mind you, had spurred his fatal decision to confront Sookie about restoring his memories with Maryann; the spot by the door where she'd clutched at her Gran's last pecan pie and lost it in front of the whole damn town.

Swallowing back her tears and dizziness, the words she'd spoken to Arlene after her Gran's funeral now echoed painfully loudly in her mind.

_"I have far more good memories of this kitchen than bad ones."_

That may be so, but Sookie was beginning to wonder if those good memories were still strong enough to outweigh the bad. In the past year and a half alone (though to her it only felt like two, maybe three months), she'd lost two of the people she loved most inside this very room. And at the risk of sounding melodramatic, she felt as though she'd lost a piece of herself in this room as well when she fired that bullet through Debbie's skull.

Everywhere she looked, she was reminded of death, lies and loss. This house felt foreign to her now, like an empty shell of the home that up till yesterday, it used to represent to her. And she didn't know if she could ever reverse it; ever make this place feel like home again.

And with that happy thought, Sookie switched off the light and went to bed before she could talk herself into doing something stupid.

* * *

_"… Heard that girl's head was blown clean off. Wonder who did it. I swear to God if it was the work of another serial killer, I'm outta this damn town. First Rene, then Sausage or Waffle or whatever the fuck his name was. Hell if I've got the money to move, but I'd rather be broke than dead, that's for sure …"_

_"… Drove right past where they found the body. I swear I could see a blood stain on the road. How fucking awesome is that? Wonder if there's still a piece of her brain lying around in them woods …"_

_"… Never really liked her anyway. Always pissed off, running her mouth at someone. Probably took it one cuss too far with the wrong person, and now look at her. Good riddance, I say. Didn't need all her negative energy up in here anyway. Fuck, I'm gonna go to hell just for thinkin' that …"_

_"… I heard she turned into a lesbian down in NOLA. No wonder God killed her …"_

Sookie slammed the bottle of ketchup she'd been refilling on the bar table and stormed off to the bathroom, instantly regretting her decision to come in to work today. It was her first shift since the news of Tara's death had spread throughout their small town, and to say it was going badly would be an understatement. She could feel the eyes of Holly and some of the lunch patrons following her as she went, but she ignored them, concentrating instead on holding it together until she could push through the restroom door.

What was wrong with these people? It was like Dawn all over again. Someone had been murdered, and all they could think about was how the deceased deserved what they'd got and that the world was better off without them. It was disgusting, and she hated that she was able to hear every word of it. What ever happened to respecting the dead? Or was that all just for show?

Well, she knew the answer to that question better than anyone.

Finally reaching the bathroom, Sookie barged in and let the tears flow. She was usually pretty good at shielding herself from others' thoughts, but when she was particularly tired or upset, her defenses were weaker, sometimes flat-out nonexistent. She had so much on her mind today and so much wearing her down that all it took was one hateful thought about Tara to slip through and catch her off guard before she became bombarded with the rest of them.

And speaking of things that were "wearing her down", where were Eric and Bill? She refused to believe they were dead, but she couldn't stop herself from thinking: what if they were? Or worse, what if Russell was torturing them at this very moment? They could be dead or dying, and what was she doing? She was here, going about her stupid, mundane schedule because she was too effing incompetent to find them faster. She was still having trouble accepting that Tara was gone, and Sookie didn't think she could handle losing one more person she loved.

Not that it would matter much; if Russell had already gotten to Eric and Bill, her days were definitely numbered. And even if Russell didn't find her, it was only a matter of time before the police did. Every waking second she didn't spend grieving Tara or worrying about her vampire-related problems, she spent paranoid that at any second, Andy Bellefleur was going to take her away in handcuffs so she could spend the rest of her life in jail for the murder of Debbie Pelt. For despite all the precautions she, Lafayette, Jessica and Jason were making to ensure Debbie's death never got traced back to her, God wouldn't make it that easy for her to get away with murder.

Covering her mouth to stifle her sobs, Sookie leaned against the bathroom sink, trying to collect herself so she could return to the job Sam was paying her to do. Before she could get any such handle on her emotions, however, Sookie found herself joined in the lady's by Holly.

Taking one look at Sookie, Holly's arms opened wide, her head tilted to the side and a sympathetic expression on her face.

"Oh sweetie, c'mere," she said, pulling Sookie in for a hug that Sookie gratefully accepted. "I'm sorry, hon, I know this must be hard for you. It's a shock to all of us. And the things these folks must be thinking… well, not even the goddess should be forced to listen to that."

Holly's hand moved soothingly over Sookie's back as she offered her some words of comfort. And as Sookie allowed herself to be consoled by Holly, her mind became suddenly flooded by memories of Tara, memories that she realized a moment later did not belong to her. Between her absent shields and close proximity to Holly, it hadn't been difficult for Sookie to slip into her fellow waitress's head. But what she found there honestly calmed her more than Holly's spoken words did.

Sookie hadn't even realized until then just how much Holly and Tara had actually bonded during their time spent captive together with Marnie. Heck even before that, Sookie could see that Holly and Tara had shared a special bond. She knew first hand how much Holly was hurting over Tara, and for whatever messed-up reason, seeing the genuine grief Holly felt for Tara actually helped Sookie get some control over hers.

Maybe what they say about misery loving company actually had some truth to it. Or maybe it was just nice to be reminded that she wasn't the only person in this town who was mourning the death of Tara Thornton. Every other thought she'd heard in the bar so far had only convinced her of the contrary, and it made her want to scream. Tara Thornton deserved better than what Bon Temps had given her, and Sookie could only wish on every damn star in the sky that the year Tara spent in New Orleans had given her a little taste of all she should have received here before she died.

"I just can't believe she's gone. She was always so strong. She survived so much, and didn't deserve to die like this," Sookie mumbled into Holly's shoulder, her head far away from the tiny bathroom they were currently sharing. "It shouldn't have been her. It should've been me," she added softly, momentarily forgetting whom she was talking to.

When Holly pulled away from her however, she quickly realized her mistake.

"Now why on Earth would you say a thing like that?" Holly asked in surprise.

Sookie took a small step back, avoiding Holly's eyes and putting all of her effort into reconstructing her shields to block out Holly's thoughts.

"I don't know. Just forget it," she hurriedly said, desperately wishing she could take back her previous statement. She couldn't afford to keep making slips like that.

For a long, tense moment, the two of them stood silently in the bathroom, and Sookie could feel Holly watching her closely. She prayed to God that she didn't look suspicious and that Holly wouldn't press her for more information because in all honesty, Sookie didn't trust herself to keep the truth a secret if Holly did.

And lucky for Sookie, Holly didn't. Instead, she seemed to think Sookie was suffering from some measure of misplaced guilt.

"Hey, don't go blamin' yourself," she began.

Sookie had to resist the urge to snort at that. If she only knew…

"You hear me? There wasn't anything anyone could've done to save Tara. The only person responsible is the one who pulled that trigger. There ain't anything for you to be feeling sorry for, most certainly not for being alive. That's no way to live your life," Holly said, a serious expression on her face. "Death hurts like a bitch, and sometimes it's easier to distract yourself from the pain and reality of it by focusing your energy on blaming someone instead. But in the end, all that does is prevent you from making your peace with it and moving forward. If you let yourself live in your anger and guilt, you'll wake up one day and find yourself nothing but empty and alone. And I don't think Tara would have wanted that for you. Do you?"

Holly paused for a moment, seemingly sensing Sookie's doubt.

"Everyone's going to die eventually," she continued gently. "And you can't hold yourself responsible for it every time they do. I'm not having that shit, okay?" she finished, the corner of her lip twitching up in a small, sad smile.

Sookie brushed her fingers under her eyes, catching the last few tears there before they could roll down her cheeks. Holly's words were undoubtedly sweet, but the fact that she'd said them without knowing the full story really dulled any meaning Sookie could rightfully derive from them. But Sookie nodded all the same, if for no other reason than to convince Holly to let the subject drop.

"Thanks, Holly," she said, forcing herself to smile and meet Holly's gaze with her own.

_'I need to get a grip,'_ Sookie thought as she did. She couldn't keep storming away in tears every time someone so much as thought Tara's name. This wasn't her first time dealing with death or grief or loss, and continuing to react this way was not helping anyone.

"You should probably get back before Sam realizes half his staff is missing. I'll be out in a sec," Sookie added, still smiling and taking care to make it look as normal as possible.

After a long moment, Holly nodded.

"Alright. You take your time though. Get yourself sorted out. The lunch crowd's pretty thin today, so I can handle it on my own for a bit," Holly said, lightly squeezing Sookie's arm before she turned to leave.

As Sookie faced the mirror and attempted to make herself look presentable again, her mind wandered to the thoughts she'd picked up from Holly a moment ago. She'd never gotten a chance to have a real conversation with Tara about what exactly happened between her and Marnie – how she got mixed up in the witch war, how she'd come to meet Marnie, what the deal was with Antonia, how she'd been kept captive in Moon Goddess, whether she'd actually begun to channel magic herself…

And then another thought occurred to Sookie, one that she was amazed didn't occur to her sooner. Why not use magic to find Eric, Bill and Pam? Maybe Holly knew some type of locator spell she could use, or even a magical method to communicate with them, allowing Sookie to pass on her warning about Russell to the missing trio. Heck, if Holly could just confirm that they were still alive, that'd be enough for Sookie. And if she didn't, well it couldn't hurt to ask, right?

Her heart was beating wildly now, excitement coursing through every inch of her body. She finally had something to work with, and knowing she was no longer going to be sitting around, wasting time feeling incredibly useless in her mission to track down Eric and Bill made her feel an amazing sense of relief.

But, a little voice in the back of Sookie's head suddenly reminded her, could she really do that to Holly? She doubted Holly would feel too thrilled at the idea of involving herself with vampires again, and Sookie didn't think she would feel right pressuring Holly to put herself in such a dangerous position after everything that had happened with Marnie. Especially when Holly had two kids to think about. Plus, if Holly were to use her magic to locate a vampire, that might fall under the topic of necromancy and Sookie doubted Eric or Bill would appreciate her creating another necromancer… As she had recently learned, vampires had zero tolerance for death-related magic, and with good reason.

Feeling deflated as she came down from her momentary high, Sookie resigned that she couldn't ask for Holly's help. At least not right away. That would have to be her last resort, a plan she would turn to only if she were desperate and every other option she had failed her. So rather reluctantly, she made herself let go of the idea. For now, she'd just have to think of something else.

With a sigh, she gave herself one last look in the bathroom mirror. It was time she got back to work. So brushing away a few stray hairs and running her hands over her apron to straighten it, she swiftly switched off the lights to join Holly outside.

No sooner had Sookie returned to her ketchup bottles behind the bar, however, was she interrupted again, this time by a physical person rather than the ghost of one.

"Hey Sook, I need to talk to you."

Sookie's eyes flicked up to see her brother standing in front of her. For a moment, she considered asking that he wait until her shift was over to talk (she'd already taken one unauthorized break today and she highly doubted Sam would appreciate her taking a second), but one look at Jason's face and Sookie knew that whatever it was couldn't wait.

She could feel the blood instantly drain from her face as she thought of all the possible things he could be here to discuss. Her fingers suddenly feeling ice cold, Sookie grabbed Jason's arm and hurriedly pulled him aside to the small stretch of hallway between the kitchen and Sam's office. Short of leaving the bar, this was the best they could do in terms of privacy.

"What is it? Did something happen with Tara or Debbie?" Sookie asked in a low voice the moment she let go of him.

"What? Oh, no. Well I mean, they did just open a missing-person case on Debbie, but you don't need to worry about that," Jason quickly assured her.

Sookie immediately relaxed. So he wasn't here to tell her she was minutes away from being carted off to prison. That was a relief. But if he wasn't here about Tara or Debbie, then what was he here for?

"Alright then, what's this about?"

Sookie crossed her arms in front of her, her impatience to get back to work already starting to seep in now that she knew what this _wasn't_ about.

"What's this about?" Jason asked, quickly getting himself worked up. "This is about Mama and Daddy being killed by vamps," he announced dramatically, keeping his voice low and looking at her expectantly.

Sookie blinked.

"Jason, Mama and Daddy died in a flood. You know that," she said slowly.

The whole freaking town knew that, and all the evidence pointed to it. The storm, the water left on the bridge, their parents' car in the river and their parents' bodies inside the car. All the tests had come back saying that Michelle and Corbett Stackhouse had drowned in a flashflood. Not even Sheriff Dearborn had suspected foul play as he did with the Rattrays. So where was all this coming from? And why was this coming up now, almost twenty years after their deaths?

"Yeah, that's what we were made to believe. But didn't you tell me Bill made it look like Mack and Denise Rattray's trailer got hit by a twister when really, he killed 'em for beating the shit out of you?" Jason pointed out, raising his eyebrows and giving her a 'now think about that' look.

"Jason, that was over a year ago. Why bring it up again now? And secondly, why on Earth would that make you think a vampire was also responsible for Mama and Daddy? They weren't drained of all their blood, and there's no reason any vampire would want to go after them."

But even as she spoke, Sookie found herself feeling less and less convinced that the story she'd been believing for two decades was true, for she suddenly remembered something else. A memory from the first "dream" she'd had of Claudine.

_"Do not fear the water. It wasn't the water that killed them."_

Between everything that had happened to her since waking up in the hospital, Sookie had honestly forgotten Claudine's cryptic warning until now. But Jason's insistence that there may be something more to the story of how their parents died brought it back again. And try as she might, Sookie couldn't shake the nagging feeling that her brother might be on to something because of it.

"Well, that's what Hadley told me."

Sookie quickly straightened, her arms uncrossing at the mention of her cousin's name.

"You saw Hadley? Where? What about Hunter, her son? Was he with her? Is he okay?" she shot at him.

"Yeah, they're both there and they're both fine," Jason practically brushed off Sookie's questions. "Hadley's working at this… secret nightclub. Kinda like Fangtasia, but for fairies."

"Fangtasia for fairies?" Sookie cut him off, looking at him curiously before another idea dawned on her. Leaning closer to him so she could whisper, she asked, "Jason, are you on V again?"

"No!" he exclaimed indignantly, louder than he'd intended and startling Terry, if the clang of metal hitting metal in the kitchen was any indication. As Sookie held up her hands in surrender (really though, could you blame her for asking?), Jason explained, readopting his lowered voice, "Look, Judge Clements took me and Andy there last night. Ask him yourself if you don't believe me. The club is out by the Thibideaux Farm." He paused, an uneasy look spreading across his face as he began nervously running his fingers through his hair in a gesture Sookie recognized all too well. "Only see, it's not really there…" he trailed off, glancing at Sookie to see just how far down the path of insane she thought he'd gone. But if this club was really a fairy club like Jason said, Sookie thought she knew what he was talking about when he said it 'wasn't really there'. "I think you need to either be a fairy or be with one to get in, and we didn't exactly part ways on the best of terms. They kinda blasted me outta the place with their light bombs, so I dunno if I'd be welcome back."

"That doesn't matter," Sookie shook her head dismissively. Jason's status with the fairies was far from the most important thing about any of this. If Hadley and Hunter were trapped somewhere in that weird, in-between-Faerie-and-here realm, then she needed to get to them before they were tricked into going to the real Fae realm. "Are Hadley and Hunter still in there?"

"Yeah, I think so," Jason said, clearly unsure why Sookie was getting so upset over his news about Hadley.

"We've gotta get them out. Fairies are bad news. They'll kidnap you, steal your life away and try to 'harvest you' for their own effed up agenda, whatever that is," she said, her mind racing with a mix of her own memories of her time in Faerie and her imagination's ideas of what fate could be in store for Hadley and Hunter. "Not to mention, they're butt-ugly," she tacked on as an afterthought.

"Whoa, butt-ugly?" Jason said, the beginnings of his goofy grin appearing in spite of the situation. "You sure these are fairies you're talking 'bout? 'Cause the ones I know are hotter than the sun in July," he added, a glint in his eye.

But Sookie wasn't playing around. Without even cracking a smile, she retorted, "Oh believe me, when they show you their true colors, it's far from pretty. Anyway, I get off work at 5. You think you could meet me back here and we can head to this fairy nightclub thing together?"

"Yeah, I'll drop by 'round 5, I guess," he said, watching her as she began backing away to return to her precious ketchup bottles.

"Thanks, Jason," she said, giving him a quick smile before scurrying off.

Great. She was really starting to feel incomplete without a fairy problem on her list of things to worry about. But now she had vampires, werewolves, humans and fairies to deal with, and really, what more could a girl ask for?


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: ****Nothing has changed; I still don't (and never will) own any rights to the characters or the world they're from. And as always, thank you to everyone who's reading my story; especially to those of you who leave comments behind. You guys are stars :)**

* * *

**SPOV**

"Okay, where is it?" Sookie asked as she and Jason trudged through the very much empty field in search of Jason's elusive fairy nightclub.

"Somewhere in this field," he answered, gesturing around with his arms and seemingly unaware of how unhelpful his answer actually was.

Sookie had to resist the urge to roll her eyes. She'd need something a little more specific than 'somewhere in this field' to work with if they hoped to find this place before dawn. The farm was huge, and while she didn't doubt the nightclub's existence, the entrance to the neighboring plane could be anywhere. She was not in the mood to trek through an entire acre or more of land to find it.

No sooner had she thought that, however, did she freeze, a faint smile on her lips. Turned out she wouldn't need to wander around the field all night after all. She'd just _felt_ it. The fairy realm.

"Over here," Sookie said urgently.

It was like her body was a radio that had just been tuned to a new frequency - one that had always been there but up till now, had simply gone unnoticed by her. She could hear the sounds of the club in her head, though whether the source of those sounds was her own ears or the new minds she was picking up on, Sookie couldn't be sure.

"It sounds like I'm right smack-dab in the middle of some sort of crazy nightclub…" she muttered distractedly.

"But you're not," Jason finished for her.

Sookie circled the area frantically. Every second she spent with this feeling of 'being in the club but not really' only caused the impatience and frustration bubbling in her stomach to grow rapidly.

"Fairies have cloaked it somehow, or it's some other dimension right next to us," she explained, her body still taken over by this need to locate the entrance. "I know it doesn't make a lick of sense –"

_Got it!_

One minute, she was standing on some old farm and the next, Sookie found herself engulfed by a bright light and dumped inside a nightclub. Though judging by the dancers on the stage to her left, perhaps 'strip club' would be more accurate.

She didn't know what she'd been expecting, but this went far beyond whatever that had been. There were lights and colors everywhere, choreographed dancing on the stage, a sea of people dressed in some admittedly tacky and strangely mismatched clothing, curtains covering what Sookie presumed to be private rooms in the back, a distinct fruity smell encompassing the entire club, and one creepy-as-hell blown up face positioned against one of the walls that looked to her like a cross between an elf, a goblin and a troll. Where Jason had gotten 'Fangtasia but for fairies', Sookie did not know because this place looked absolutely nothing like Fangtasia. Well, aside from the strippers...

And speaking of Jason… Sookie quickly turned around to see if her brother had come through with her. He hadn't, but she could see him stomping around outside through the door she'd just come through, yelling at thin air and apparently still unable to see either her or this entire club.

"Come on, Jason."

Reaching for his wrist, Sookie grabbed her brother and pulled him in with her.

Once inside, the two of them wandered around the club, Sookie with her eyes glued to the dancers and Jason angrily marching up to one of them, going off about something to do with a tie. Admittedly, Sookie wasn't paying much attention to him at the moment. Rather, she was completely mesmerized by the dancers as she watched them do things with their bodies she couldn't even begin to dream of doing with her own.

"Sookie?"

She whipped around at the sound of the voice of the very reason she was here in the first place.

"Hadley!" she exclaimed in relief, running up to her cousin.

"Oh my god, I thought you were dead!" Hadley said, expertly maneuvering around the tray of drinks wrapped around her neck to pull Sookie in for a hug. "I was sure the vampires had gotten you for good!"

"Is Hunter here?" Sookie quickly cut her off, pulling away from Hadley and deciding to get straight to it.

They'd have time to catch up later. Right now, they needed to get Hunter and get out. Fast.

"Of course," Hadley answered, taking no notice of the urgency in Sookie's voice but instead marching straight past her to weave her way to the tables at the center of the club.

Sookie quickly followed her cousin, pushing her way through the crowd in an effort to keep up with Hadley. She was soon joined by a disgruntled Jason, but she didn't have the time to ask him what was bothering him. Her focus right now was on Hadley.

"We've got to get him out of here. These fairies are gonna try to take him," Sookie said, trying to make Hadley understand the seriousness of their situation. Really, she could not comprehend why they were wasting time bringing drinks to tables.

"What? No!" Hadley said, not even looking up from her table as she casually brushed off Sookie's concerns. "He's safe here. They're keeping us both safe," she insisted as she finally turned to face Sookie again.

"They're not what they seem," Sookie warned, a little annoyed at Hadley's dismissive attitude and desperate to make Hadley see the truth before it was too late. Why couldn't Hadley just take her word for it and let her explain the details later, when they were back and safe in their own plane? She didn't know how much longer they had until someone noticed them and she was starting to get that jittery feeling she got when she was racing against time to get something done.

"Yes, but who is?" came the sound of an unfamiliar male voice from behind her.

Crap.

Alarmed and preparing herself for a fight, Sookie turned to the sound of the voice. But to her surprise, she was met, not by a menacing smirk or a mini army of fairies intent on keeping her prisoner here, but by a single, beaming man dressed in an open pink vest who wasted no time running up to her and giving her a tight hug.

What the?

"It's so good to see you again, Sookie!" the man said as he pulled away, leaving her bewildered.

Yeah, she'd say the same if a) she wasn't worried about being kidnapped to Faerie and losing another year of her life and b) they'd actually seen each other a first time. But Sookie knew for a fact that this face was not one she'd laid eyes on before. And she told him as much.

"Uhh… I don't think we've met."

Even to her own ears, she sounded rude and unwelcoming, but quite frankly she didn't really care. Sookie knew first-hand that fairies were a dangerous race. They charmed you with their smiles and their light and your pre-conceived notions that fairies were just harmless Disney characters, only to reveal their true, menacing nature. She didn't trust anyone in this club half as far as she could throw them.

But her attitude wasn't dampening this young man's day, no sir. He just continued smiling brightly at her as he insisted that yes, they had met, for he was the one who'd helped her escape Faerie. Sookie, however, wasn't buying it. The guy in front of her now looked absolutely nothing like the pointy-eared, wiry-haired fairy who'd brought her to one of the last portals back to this world. On the contrary, he looked very handsome with a clean-shaven and flawless face, perfectly cut brown hair and matching warm, brown eyes.

"Claudine was my sister," the man added, taking note of her crossed arms and disbelieving stance and hoping that detail would sway her.

Sookie, however, was still unconvinced.

"Really? No way, that guy had meth teeth and bat ears," she said, much to Hadley's amusement. Well at least someone was enjoying this.

"Well that's because fairies naturally adjust to the standard of beauty to whatever frequency we channel," he explained.

"_That's_ the standard of beauty for Faerie?" she blurted out before she could stop herself.

Yeah, Sookie knew her Gran would be pretty appalled at her behavior right about now, but sometimes, you just had to know when to throw in the towel and accept defeat. Because Sookie becoming the sweet Southern Belle Gran had always envisioned? She was pretty sure her last hopes of _that_ had been dashed somewhere around the time when she'd shoved a shovel into a man's neck.

"Well, like your overgrown baby heads are much better?"

In her opinion? Yes. But hey, to each his own.

"My name's Claude, by the way. In case you don't remember. Look, I've got to get back to work, but if you want to talk…" the fairy – _Claude _ – offered, pointing to the bar behind him.

Sookie could feel Jason's eyes on her as she studied Claude suspiciously. She still wasn't entirely sure she could trust this man or what he was saying, and she wasn't stupid enough to let her guard down around him just yet either. At least not completely. But her gut was telling her that he was speaking the truth, and logically, she reasoned that if he were trying to keep her prisoner here or take her back to Faerie, he wouldn't have to play nice with her to do it. Not when he was in a room full of fairy allies. So she nodded cautiously and followed Claude to the bar, Jason trailing behind her while Hadley went back to waitressing.

For a minute, Sookie just let him do his thing while she tried to think up what to say first. Did she say 'thank you' for helping her escape Mab (assuming that really was him who'd saved her)? Or should she say something about Claudine? If Claudine had been his sister, he must be grieving for her.

Leaning a little closer to the table between them, she said, "Sorry about Claudine," deciding this was a safe way to start the conversation and bring up her deceased fairy godmother.

"She chose her fate," Claude said in response, catching her eye and smiling sadly as he continued cleaning the glass in his hand. "We all did."

Sookie returned his sad smile with a sympathetic one of her own. She couldn't help but feel partly responsible for Claudine's demise, and while she agreed with what Claude had said about Claudine 'choosing her fate', she did feel bad about Claudine dying on her front lawn. Especially considering all Claudine had supposedly done to protect Sookie before she'd tried trapping her in Faerie.

"Some of my other sisters are here though," Claude added brightly and Sookie raised an eyebrow at the quick change in the tone of the conversation. This guy never let anything get him down for long, did he? Sookie wondered if that was a fairy thing or just a Claude thing.

"There's Claudette, Claude-Ellen, Claudwina and there's Claudia," he continued, Sookie's gaze following the direction of his finger as he pointed to each of his sisters in turn.

Just as Sookie was moving to face Claude again, Hadley returned, tray empty and ready to take another round of drinks to customers. She smiled quickly at Sookie and Jason, intending to quickly collect her drinks and go. But for the second time that night, Hadley's reappearance had jolted Sookie back to action, reminding her of the other reason she'd come here tonight.

"My parents," she stated to Claude, speaking before she could actually think through the best way to approach the subject.

But the two words had been enough to make the fairy in front of her pause. She could feel Jason shift closer to her too, his interest piqued now that they were finally talking about the reason _he_ had wanted to come here tonight.

"What about them?" Claude asked, feigning nonchalance.

Sookie could hear in his mind, however, that he knew exactly what she was asking about. She considered calling him out on it by shooting him a thought of her own, but in the end, decided to play along, namely for Jason's sake as he wouldn't be able to hear a conversation Sookie and Claude had through their thoughts.

"Is it true? Did vampires kill my parents or not?" she asked, making clear from her tone that she wasn't going to be taking any more bullshit.

_"__I was hoping it wouldn't come to this. Now I have to tell her. Which means more trouble with the elders… If Claudine were still here, she'd kill me. Sookie is not going to take this well…"_ she heard, having taken her chance to peer into Claude's mind. She couldn't help but notice, however, that Claude's thoughts had been… muddled in her own head when she did, going in and out of focus like a phone call from an area with poor reception. This was hardly the first time that had happened to her recently though, and she decided to just chalk it up to stress and lack of sleep, as she had been doing since she'd first noticed her telepathy going shaky a week or so prior.

"Do you know which vampire it was?" Jason added, correctly interpreting the resigned expression on Claude's face and taking another tiny step closer.

This time, Sookie didn't need her mind-reading abilities to see what was going on inside Claude's head. His internal conflict over answering their questions was clearly written on every inch of his body.

After a second, he put down the glass to give them an answer.

"All I know is what Claudine told me," he began in a low voice. "A vampire ambushed your parents. He was drawn to them by something he smelled in the backseat of their car." He paused, looking as if he were deliberating something and not once taking his eyes off her.

Sookie, meanwhile, was beginning to feel restless as she waited for him to continue. And? What had the vampire smelled? What had he been after the night he'd murdered her Mama and Daddy?

Finally, Claude answered.

"Your blood."

Everything froze.

'Your blood.'

The words rang in Sookie's ears as she took an instinctive step back, trying to comprehend what Claude was telling her.

She felt split in two, one half of her mind racing through thought after thought, drudging up random pieces of information to prove to herself that what Claude had said made sense, while the other half just repeated the word 'no', refusing to accept Claude's last two words as true. Because if they were and her parents' killer had been searching for her blood, then it was her fault. She was the reason her parents were dead. Her blood, which had already caused her problem after problem in the supe world, was also responsible for the tragedy that had started them all, the one that had made her and Jason orphans.

"No, I don't believe you. I don't believe any of you," Sookie shouted, not because she didn't believe Claude, but because she _couldn't_.

In her emotional haze, she lifted her arms, intending to blast something, _anything_, with her light when for the first time since she'd discovered her power, her light flickered.

Distracted for the smallest of seconds by her inability to produce the one true supernatural weapon she possessed, the attention of every other fairy in the room was suddenly locked on her. In unison, four of them raised their own hands and, unlike Sookie, were successful in shooting their light.

One moment Sookie was engulfed in a ball of blinding white, and the next everything was black.

* * *

"You're depleting Sookie," Claude informed her, having brought her back to consciousness a few seconds prior.

Sookie had awoken to find herself reclining on a (admittedly soft, yet comfortably firm) chaise longue in the middle of what she presumed to be one of the back rooms of the nightclub. There had also been three hands hovering over her body – two on either side of her head belonging to Claude and one over her chest belonging to one of Claude's sisters (Claudia?) - all of which had retreated the moment her eyes had fluttered open.

According to Jason, they had been 'testing her luminescence' – whatever the hell that was – and apparently, she was depleting. Yeah, okay…

"Fuck you, I'm depleting. I wanna go home. Come on, Jason. Let's go," she said, leaping to her feet and fully intending to walk right out of this nightclub and never look back. She'd had more than enough of fairies and their secrets and lies to last her a lifetime.

Coming here tonight had been a mistake; she knew that now. Hadley was clearly fine (if it were up to her, Sookie would grab Hadley and Hunter and drag them away from these fairies as fast as possible, but Hadley was a big girl who could make her own life choices) and what she'd learned about her parents… well as far as that was concerned, ignorance really was bliss.

She was trying not to think about them, trying to build up a mental dam to stop any thoughts on her parents from leaking through. But the longer she pushed against the thoughts threatening to break her, the harder it became for her to do so. She only needed to hold it together for a few more minutes, she told herself. Just long enough to escape this place and retreat back to her own home.

Jason, however, didn't budge.

"Hey, let's just plug her in and charge her back up," he suggested to Claude, enthusiastically mimicking the act with his hands while Sookie shot her brother a 'what the fuck' look that went completely unnoticed by him. What did he think she was? A cellphone? And why was he listening to anything these guys were saying anyways?

Claude, meanwhile, was hurriedly trying to convince Sookie not to leave, ignoring Jason.

"Whether you believe it or not, my family has been watching over your family for centuries. Just hear us out, okay? It's for your own good," he practically begged her to give them a chance.

Every cell in her body wanted to ignore him and go home, but for one reason or another, there was also something else that refused to let her. Eric would probably call it her survival instinct, but she thought 'gullibility' would be a better word for it. And although Sookie didn't say anything to indicate that she'd agreed to 'hear them out', the fairy siblings seemed to take the fact that she hadn't walked out of the room as being good enough for them.

"I'm going to ask you something. Please answer honestly," jumped in Claudia, whom Sookie promptly turned to face.

Once again, Sookie made no promises to do any such thing but again, Claudia took her continued presence to be enough.

"Have you been experiencing any disturbances in your abilities?" Claudia asked, her question capturing not only Sookie's full attention, but her curiosity as well.

"Disturbances like?" Sookie prodded.

"Like hearing thoughts. Sometimes it might be a strain to listen. Sometimes you can't hear much at all," Claudia elaborated, her words making Sookie temporarily forget her eagerness to get out of here and her irritation with fairies in general.

"Come to think of it, I have been a little off my game lately," Sookie answered, beginning to feel truly concerned now.

But how did Claudia know about that? Sure, she'd had that little light mishap just now, but as far as Claudia should have known, that could have been nothing more than a fluke.

"What we are and what you are, Sookie, is magical," Claudia explained. "But because you're only half-fae, your magic is finite. You will run out if you don't take the proper precautions."

Run out? She could do that?

"What happens if I do run out?" Sookie asked, directing her question at Claude instead. "Would I die?" she added, panicked.

If running out of magic was fatal to her and she was currently 'depleting'…

"You wouldn't, but –"

No sooner had Claude assured her that her life was not at risk did another thought pop into Sookie's head, this one exciting her rather than scaring her like the last one.

"Would I be normal? Would I be human?" she asked, cutting him off and not daring to believe it until he confirmed it for her.

After a moment of hesitation, Claude answered, "You would be fae no longer, yes."

Sookie couldn't help the small smile that lit her face at Claude's words as she found herself imagining and truly considering the possibilities of what that could mean for her.

How many times had she daydreamed about living a normal, non-supernatural-filled life? Heck, she didn't think she'd ever stopped fantasizing about it from the moment she'd realized that hearing people's thoughts was not a common ability. When it came down to it, Sookie had made all of her biggest decisions thus far in an attempt to further her pursuit of that happy, ordinary life. Normalcy, to her, had always been the ultimate goal, the one thing she'd always fought for even when she knew that she could never have it. But had she been wrong there? Was all that truly possible for her after all? It almost sounded too good to be true.

"Wait, what did you mean when you said 'proper precautions'?" she asked, suddenly remembering exactly what Claudia had said earlier. "What would I have to do if I didn't want to become normal?"

Claude and Claudia shared a look before Claude met Sookie's eyes to answer her.

"Well see, as a half-fae, your magic is finite and as Claudia said, you will run out if you're not careful," he started. "But our magic isn't like other forms of magic. It doesn't exist solely within certain beings or objects. Our magic is literally everywhere. It is a part of nature; it _is_ nature. It is in the air and earth around us, which is why full fae never run out. We're constantly channeling it."

He paused, and Sookie knew he was trying to think of the best way to phrase what he wanted to say next.

"You know that science gibberish you humans like to learn about? The thing about the conservation of energy: 'energy can be neither created nor destroyed, only transferred'?" he finally spoke, his words causing flashes of seventh grade science to flash through Sookie's head.

She nodded for him to go on.

"Well our magic works much in the same way. As you lose your magic bit by bit, it isn't lost forever. It merely leaves your body to reenter the world around you. And just as you can lose magic to nature, nature can give magic back to your body - under certain conditions."

'Certain conditions'? That sounded ominous. Sookie shifted her weight from one foot to the next, all of her attention directed at Claude.

"While the fae in you wants to regain the magic it's lost, the human part of your body rejects it. Essentially, your fae side isn't strong enough to absorb the world's magic on its own; you need to be around other fae to do it. So while we can't exactly just plug you in and recharge you as your brother suggested, by being in our company for extended periods of time, we can help you regain the magic you've lost and sustain the levels of fae magic you were born with, ensuring that you don't run out," he finished, waiting for her reaction.

Sookie's head was spinning from all the information she'd absorbed in the past half-hour.

"So you're saying that if I want to be normal, I just need to stay away from fairies and let my magic run out?" she asked slowly, trying to process what Claude had told her.

"Yes," Claude answered curtly.

"But if I want to stay part-fae, then I need to be around you all more often so you can help my body refuel itself on fairy magic?" she continued, slowly beginning to understand the position this left her in.

Claude nodded.

For a second, nobody spoke, each person (or fairy) in the room lost in his or her own thoughts. Thoughts from people, Sookie reminded herself, she may never need to hear thoughts from again. If she so chose.

"Okay. Well, thanks for an interesting night," Sookie broke the silence, eager to return home so she could think everything over in private and at her own pace. "Now if you'll excuse me, I think it's time I head home. Jason, you coming?" she turned to her brother.

But before they could go, Claudia stopped them once more.

"Sookie, listen to me. We fae are capable of things you haven't even begun to explore. I urge you to think very carefully about whatever decision you make. Don't throw away your faeness so quickly, or underestimate just how much you can do with it," she implored.

Sookie swallowed, Claudia's words only adding to her desire to get the hell out of there. Now that she knew exactly what was going on with her body, her mind had returned to its previous state of battling against unwanted thoughts about her parents, and combined with the added pressure of the big choice she had to make, it was all beginning to make her feel like she was suffocating.

"I'll keep that in mind," she promised, moving to leave.

But for the third time that night, she was stopped.

"I hope we've at least convinced you of our trustworthiness. If you have any questions, you'll know where to find us," Claude said.

"I will," Sookie responded tightly before turning back to Jason. "We should say goodbye to Hadley before we leave."

And to Sookie's relief, this time, Claude and Claudia allowed her and Jason to go.

* * *

Even after a long shower, Sookie still felt troubled as her mind remained fixated on the two big pieces of news she'd learned that night from Claude. First, there was the truth about not only how her parents had died, but also why they'd been killed – a truth she now desperately wished she could unlearn. In and of itself, the information about her parents had been a lot for Sookie to take in, but the surprises for the night had not ended there. There was also the decision she now knew she had to make about her powers.

For the first time in her life, she felt in complete control of her future. She could be normal. She could have a human husband, raise human kids and never again have to be cursed with the burden of knowing exactly what every person was thinking every moment of every day. She'd be able to experience the silence she presently only ever received from vampires, but from _everyone_. Total quiet. The basis of every fantasy she'd ever had.

But now that she was being presented with the opportunity to make her biggest dream a reality, Sookie found that her decision wasn't as obvious as she'd have thought it would be. As much as she yearned for a life without telepathy, a life without telepathy meant a lot more than just a life of silence to her now. Despite seeing it as a handicap for most of her life, Sookie also knew that her mind-reading had come in handy now and again, her abilities having saved lives more than once. What if she found herself in a situation where she'd once again need to use her powers to save her own life or the life of someone she loved?

And then there was her light. Even without her fairy powers, Sookie knew that vampires and weres and all the other supes out there would not just cease to exist because her powers did – and she didn't want them to either. But her light was the one defense she had against them, the one weapon she possessed when it came to warding off those who meant to do her harm. Was she truly prepared to let all of that go? Because once she lost those powers, she would never be able to get them back again.

And speaking of supes, if it hadn't been for her fairy powers, she never would have met or befriended any of the supes she had. She never would have met Bill, who had entered her life solely to procure her for the queen because of what she was. Nor would she have known Eric, whom she'd only met because meeting Bill had inspired her to consider going to Fangtasia for answers about Dawn and Maudette's deaths. She also would have never met Alcide, never needed to work for and thus befriend Sam, and never reconnected with Hadley. Then there was Jessica who would probably still be a human and never would have stepped foot in Bon Temps or Sookie's life had Bill not been forced to turn her. And Sookie would have never gone to Dallas, never forged her sort-of-friendship with Barry, and never gotten to know one of the kindest beings – human, vampire, were, fairy or shifter – she'd ever met: Godric.

In short, the supes her powers had attracted weren't all bad and the people she'd met because of those powers were some of the people she was closest to today. If she hadn't had her powers, she wouldn't have those relationships.

But the consequences of her fae heritage weren't all great either, she reminded herself, switching back to her original mindset. So many people were dead today who wouldn't be if she'd just been born normal, and as she'd learned tonight, her parents were at the very top of that list. Mama and Daddy were dead because of her – because of what she was. And that knowledge alone made her feel so disgusted in herself and her powers that she had half a mind to throw them from her body that very instant.

But before she could do any such thing, Sookie suddenly snapped to attention as her mind picked up on a mental void at the edge of her property. There was a vampire watching her.

Her body tense and her heartbeat racing, Sookie slowly stood from her bed and moved to her bedroom window so she could attempt to look past the trees and through the darkness at whoever was out there. Unfortunately, her mostly-human eyes couldn't spot anything, but she knew that he (or she) was still lurking outside, whoever he was. And while a part of her hoped that the void belonged to Eric or Bill, her gut was telling her that the vampire outside was not a friend. If he had been, he'd have come to her door, not lurked near the end of her driveway.

So what was he here for? And more importantly, what was he going to do? Would he try to enter her home? Her eyes widening, Sookie realized that if he did, nothing would stop the vampire from succeeding since Eric still owned the deed to the house. Or would the vampire simply assume he could not enter and instead, try to draw her outside?

Sookie was currently stuck between two plans of action: one defensive and the other potentially suicidal.

She could grab her family's shotgun and all the silver she could find, and hole herself up somewhere in the house until the sun rose, forcing the vampire to go to ground. Eric's cubby honestly sounded safest seeing as it was underground and most likely made to withstand a lot considering that Eric had built it with the intention of sleeping in it.

Or she could just speed up the whole thing, stop wasting everyone's time by prolonging the inevitable, and go outside to face whoever was out there tonight. If her powers decided they wanted to work, she might be able to disable him long enough to stake him and thus have a chance at saving her own ass. But, she reminded herself, if they didn't, she'd end up dead.

Even to her own mind, both plans pretty much sucked. She hated the idea of flat out hiding in some underground room like a scared and naive little girl when danger was literally just outside her door, but her chances of survival if she made the first move were slim with her powers being as unreliable as they currently were. But what else could she do? How was she supposed to come up with anything better when she didn't even know who or what she was supposed to be protecting herself from?

Her only comfort at that moment came from the knowledge that since she was alone, no matter what she chose, nobody else could get hurt tonight by being caught in the crossfire.

Before she could make a decision on what to do, however, Sookie felt the void move. For one heart-stopping moment, Sookie thought the vampire was approaching the house, but a second later, she realized that whoever was out there was _leaving_ instead.

In the span of a single second, the vampire had vanished from the area her mind could reach, but it took Sookie much longer than that to begin to feel remotely safe again. She had no idea why the vampire had left so suddenly and she knew there was nothing stopping him from coming back. So she waited, still standing at her window and not moving a single muscle.

But as the minutes passed and Sookie's mind remained blissfully vamp-free, she slowly began to accept that the vampire wasn't going to be returning. Not tonight, at least.

Letting out her first steady breath since she'd discovered her unwelcome visitor, Sookie collapsed onto her bed feeling suddenly drained. It was beginning to feel to Sookie like no matter where she turned, she was faced with yet another supernatural being intent on harming her one way or another. The minute she defeated one enemy, another would appear to take its place, from Maryann to Russell to Mab to Marnie to Debbie to Russell again and now this. And she'd be foolish to believe that would ever change.

God, she was so fucking sick of always being the easy target to stronger supes; she was sick of always relying on someone else, intentionally or not, to get her out of danger; she was sick of being left to watch as everyone around her died to protect her. And she refused to do it any longer. She needed to learn to fight.

Her fairy blood may have been responsible for her parents' deaths, and keeping her powers now would do nothing to change the past or bring them back. But neither would letting them fizzle out. Her parents, Tara, Gran… they were all dead, and for them, death was final. But Jason, Lafayette, Sam, Jessica, Arlene… these people were still alive. And she still had the power to protect them and stop them from joining the dead.

Sookie had made her decision. Tomorrow when morning came, she was going to return to Claude and ask him to train her.

* * *

**A/N: ****So good news to those of you who have been missing our dear Viking these past two chapters: Eric will be returning to the story in Chapter 7. Yay~ Yes, I know this part of the fic has been very Sookie-centric. It's just that to me, ****Sookie needed to do a little growing before I felt she was ready to, not only be with Eric, but become the character I believe she's capable of being.**

**Also, I'm pretty positive this is going to be the last chapter that takes scenes directly from the show. A lot of the first half of this chapter mirrored what happened when Sookie went to Hooligan's/Hot Wings for the first time on TB (from now on, I'll be sticking to the book's name for the nightclub and call it Hooligan's because I honestly like that name much better than the show's) because the stuff she learned about her parents here is the same as the stuff on the show and that info is important to the story. So I included it. But I'm 99% sure the rest of the story will be entirely separate from anything TB gave us in S5. I hope you all are as excited as I am to get to it!**

**That's all for now! Thank you everyone for continuing to read my fic. Here's to hoping I get Chapter 7 done quicker than I did these past few.**


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